Her hydrorb worked well on the creature’s head, at least, and it whipped to the side like an overacted stunt actor receiving a punch. Sinaya’s meteor hammer appeared from the other direction, crushing the creature’s head between the water and the metal ball of death. It fell to the ground, no creature able to survive the crushing vice grip of their combo attack.
Meanwhile, Lily smashed a rock straight into another spikey antelope approaching the Capy pack. She hit it from the front, causing its head to stop like it hit a wall, its body and legs still moving forward at the same pace, a scene straight out of Looney Toons. The creatures looked imposing with their spikey bodies, but they were too stupid to take advantage of their defenses, charging into their attacks like lemmings.
Anika wanted the monsters, called pantopu, to be good. The imposing quills and their anti-magic tips sounded like a great defensive monster. But whatever monster Lily used her ability on, Anika assumed they would share some of the stats of the original creature. The pantopu, as a tabletop monster, would easily have a -5 modifier to intelligence. If they retained their current level of intelligence, they would constantly run into every battle head first with absolutely no thought to their safety and would get them all killed. She did not need another creature that required babysitting.
They finished off the last pantopu with a joint attack between Sinaya’s weapon and Lily’s rock, smashing in the head before it reached the Capy pack, the group of capybaras just standing there doing nothing more than enticing the dumb monsters forward.
Anika sighed, “Well, we are definitely not picking that one.”
“They were super easy to kill! Let’s fight more of them!” Lily bounded over to Anika, excited by the success of their fight.
In total, they had killed half a dozen pantopu before they ran close enough to do any damage to the party. Anika agreed with Lily that they should fight more of them due to their quick deaths. But she also thought they needed to decide which monster Lily would use her clone ability on first.
“Let’s check out the last monster on my list first. We need to make a decision and use your clone ability before we start fighting seriously for experience. The water buffalo monster we haven’t seen yet sounds like it has good defenses.”
“We should find them nearby. They spawn in an area not far from here. I remember them from my assessment!” Sinaya volunteered, gesturing towards the north east.
The group set off across the prairie, looking for another small herd of monsters. Lily and Sinaya chatted about the scenery, while Anika focused on looking for the monsters and keeping track of anything approaching on her mini-map. Leka followed at a distance, occasionally veering off their path to collect items into her pouch. Anika would need to ask her what magical plants she collected here, as nothing in the prairie area had a marking on the map like the Leshiru mushroom patch near the entrance of the dungeon.
Spotting movement directly to the north, Anika called for the group to enter their attack formation. Lily directed her six transformed capybaras to stand between the group and the approaching monsters, and Anika readied her bow. She doubted Water magic would work well on the water buffalo, if that was what approached.
Lily somehow managed to remain silent as the group walked close enough to assess the situation. Three water buffalo approached, their black, and surprisingly goat-like, bodies swaying as they walked forward, heads down as they slowly grazed their way south.
“Lily, stay back with me, their hooves could do some serious damage if they charged.” Anika gestured behind her, imagining Lily as Simba trying to avoid the rampaging water buffalo stampede. At least they weren’t trapped in a ravine.
“Send the Capy pack forward, and Sinaya can approach along with them. As soon as we are all in range, we will start with the one on the right.” Anika waited for Sinaya to reach the line of capybaras before pulling her bow up to aim. The monsters hadn’t noticed them yet, so they should manage a nice surprise attack on the unsuspecting buffalo.
Anika saw Sinaya’s meteor hammer start to glow red, a signal that the girl had started channeling her magic into it, preparing to attack. Lily’s favorite rock floated over her head, ready to fly forward at the bovine’s brow. Anika nodded to Sinaya and Lily, the signal to engage, and drew her arrow back, aiming towards the first monster. Anika had no idea if the arrow would penetrate deep enough from the front to cause any damage, but she still felt the urge to pick the larger target versus aiming for smaller, more vulnerable locations like eye sockets. She loosed her arrow as Sinaya swung her meteor hammer forward. Sinaya opted for the creature’s head, the powerful speed of the meteor hammer easily able to crush bone, while Anika’s arrow found purchase in the creature’s chest, just below the neck.
The behemoth had surprising resistance to Sinaya’s swinging ball of death, its skull clearly made of stronger stuff than human bone. While the meteor hammer did damage, it was not the instant kill Anika expected after watching giant hummingbirds disappear in an explosion of feathers or the easily smashed skulls of the pantopu. Their tankier physique already made the buffalo a much better prospective target for their party than the spikey antelopes.
Lily’s rock swooped in to hit the buffalo square in the face. The creature, however, stood still as they initiated their attacks. Most unfortunately, the buffalo trio didn’t have the same comical reaction to Lily’s attack that Anika had seen with the pantopu. The rock did inconsequential damage, which Anika expected after seeing the result of Sinaya’s wrecking ball of an attack crash off the cow’s skull.
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The triple attack did succeed in capturing the attention of the water buffalo, however, and all three raised their heads to stare at their attackers, nostrils flaring with rage as they prepared their own counter attacks.
Water began to collect around their horns, slowly trickling to form a mane of water over their neck as they charged forward towards the party. Once they had covered their necks with a watery sheen they started to move as the layer of water continued to expand and stretch along their bodies to cover their back and sides.
Anika quickly pulled another arrow and aimed at the creature’s head, hoping for a lucky eye shot. The book said they used the water as a defensive layer, creating a shield around their bodies that reduced the damage done by some attacks. Piercing attacks like her arrow, however, could cut through the watery shield easily. Lily’s rock, on the other hand, would have reduced effectiveness.
Despite knowing she could effectively aim for the broad side of the cow, she couldn’t help but want to score that sweet, critical head shot and end the encounter sooner. While the body shot held a higher chance of hitting, it also had a significantly lower chance of puncturing a vital organ. One eye shot attempt wouldn’t hurt.
The arrow flew from Anika’s bow and hit the rightmost water buffalo in the head, missing the eye socket and instead scraping the broad forehead of the creature before deflecting off the top of the creature’s head. They definitely didn’t need a water shield around their Superman-like skulls.
Sinaya’s meteor hammer met the head of the creature twice more in rapid succession, one of the passes scoring a hit close to the creature’s eye. That finally made an impact on the creature, and it collapsed onto the ground, not completely dead, but certainly out of the fight.
The remaining two water buffalo began to lower their heads as they reached the capybara line. The water shield now completely covered their backs and sides, sunlight glinting off the veil of water as they moved. Anika quickly pulled another arrow and grudgingly targeted the creature’s side. She knew that her arrow would pierce the shield and had much more chance of doing damage with the guaranteed shot of the fleshy chest versus the cranium of steel.
Two of those iron heads made contact with two members of the Capy pack. The capybaras in question had turned around so that they did not have to go head to head with the superior strength of the bovine-goat creatures. The impact lifted them up and sent them flying backwards to land a solid twenty feet away. The capybara managed to stay alive, but was definitely down for the count.
Now that the buffalo were within the pack, they wouldn’t have momentum to use for future attacks, which would hopefully allow the group to take them out before they reduced any of the Capy Cultivation experience buff that Anika and the party enjoyed. She fired another arrow at the center buffalo as Lily and Sinaya attacked it simultaneously. Their joint attack managed to stun the creature, its durable skull not able to withstand the crushing impact as much as it withstood the single sided hits. Anika saw the creature stutter step, noting the now slightly disfigured head.
“Do that again! It worked better when you hit at the same time!”
Anika pulled another arrow but decided not to fire quite yet. She should have already used one of her crowd control abilities to protect the Capy pack, but she had too much focus on everyone else to think about her own abilities. She quickly cast her Ray of Light ability, directing one beam to each of Water Buffalo, both about to engage in another powerful headbutt towards members of the Capy pack. They reacted to the spell immediately, waving their heads groggily around and backing up as they tried to shake off the disorienting confusion.
“Hit them now!” She called to Lily and Sinaya, taking her arrow off the bowstring, knowing that the other members of her party could finish off the buffalo much more effectively than she could with arrows.
A dual rock and meteor hammer combo slammed into the center monster a second time, and this time it fell to the ground. The duo quickly repeated the action twice more on the last Water Buffalo, Anika’s spell effect preventing it from making another, final attack.
“Those had much better defenses than the pantopu. I’m a little disappointed though. The pantopu died so quickly, their spikey intimidation factor didn’t matter at all.” Anika put her arrow back into her quiver and twirled the bow around like a majorette with a baton. Her improved agility had its perks for random fidgeting.
“I think the buffalo could make a good companion. It managed to survive some powerful attacks from Sinaya, despite her hitting it in the head. I hit them with several arrows and neither took it out. But the sun bear also has great defenses with its rock skin. It took several hits from both of us and had resistance to the blunt attacks as well as the piercing attacks. I think the rock skin does better against the water shield for physical attacks, though the book said the water shield granted resistance to all magic types except Aether. The rock skin had weaknesses to Aether and Water.” Anika summarized her thoughts out loud, hoping to get opinions from the others before they made their decision.
“The water shield is weak to piercing and slashing attacks,” Sinaya commented, “those are common among dungeon monsters.”
“True,” Anika nodded, “I think that rock would do much better against the dungeon monsters, and it had claws and teeth to attack as well, whereas the water buffalo could only attack with its charge. That makes it less useful for a tank and spank fight.”
“A what?” Sinaya looked at her, confusion clear on her face.”
“Oh, sorry, I mean it’s not good when we have to stand our ground against a monster and fight. The water buffalo needs mobility to do damage, and if we are using it as our primary defensive line, it wouldn’t be able to do a lot of damage. The bear could attack with its claws and teeth and still stand its ground.”
“And the bear was cute! I want a bear!” Lily did an excited little hop, “It’s my ability! I want the bear!”
Anika laughed, “Well, I guess it’s lucky that the bear seems like the best defensive choice, then.”
—--
“I’ve never paid much attention to your imports before.. but really? You added Water magic to water buffalo? And here I thought Earth lacked creativity.” Air laughed as he watched the monitor over Water’s shoulder.
“I’m not sure whether I should be offended or not…” Earth looked from Air to Water, not sure if he should involve himself in another of their tangles.
“Definitely insulted!” Water spun her chair to glare up at Air. “It makes sense to give a water buffalo water magic! If we gave it fire magic, you’d say it made no sense! I give my creatures logical additions to the base templates. Unlike you!”
“That’s because I try to avoid the templates.” Air waved off Water’s comment.
“You took that hummingbird template from the system and all you did was make their beaks extra pointy. That is as bad as Earth’s Degeta templates!”
“Okay, now I’ve definitely been insulted.” Earth grumbled, crossing his arms and slouching in his chair in a huff.
[LitRPG] [Cultivation] [Crafting] [Smart MC]
Synopsis (Click to Expand)
To transcend the heavens, one must first forge the ladder.
He is a Cultivator who values volume over speed.
He is a Chronicler who will not stop at the sky.