Strongest Nova: Path of Vengeance

Chapter 95: Team

Stanley felt the death of the person who was smashed into the ground. He felt a chill pass through him, seeing the man so viciously killed right then and there.

The man’s body was turned into a mush, mixing with the mud that was on the ground, his blood diluted by the rainwater.

The loud sound of the rain just made everything all the more eerie.

The way he was killed, the way the Crawler so casually moved on after not even leaving a whole corpse of his body... it reminded Stanley of the time when one did the same to his mother.

Remembering the moment now, it did not bring back any fear or anxiety. No.

All that it brought back was anger. Uncontrollable, unstoppable anger.

Without hesitation, Stanley ran toward the Crawler.

"Hey, kid! Don’t—"

A man tried to stop him, but he had to dodge at the last moment as the Crawler’s limb fell on top of him.

Stanley arrived as close to the Crawler as he could without being swatted away by multiple limbs. He stayed at just the distance where only 1 of the limbs could reach him and that would be the one he attacked.

The Crawler noticed him without turning toward him. Its limb fell on him, but he was ready. He jumped to the side, letting the limb hit the ground. He put up his arm to shield himself from the mud that would splatter onto him.

Then he swung the sword into the Crawler’s limb. The sword went in a small way in before immediately becoming impossible to move further in.

The eerily crawling thin black veins on its limbs, like a thousand different centipedes moving all at once, were extremely disturbing to see up close.

He pulled his back and it came out quite easily. At the place where the monster was cut, the black veins crawled out from its skin, reaching for each other as the cut healed.

Stanley had seen what was inside during the moment it healed.

Nothing. There was nothing. It was a pitch-black surface with colors even darker than the one on the surface. At least the surface looked oily like ink and reflected lights from around it.

The inside was just entirely black.

He changed his stance again and stabbed the monster once again. Stanley’s sword went in about a palm length of the way in, and yet the monster didn’t cry in pain or even showed any sign of being hurt. It couldn’t feel anything.

He quickly pulled his sword back and got ready again. The Crawler pulled back its limb and thrust forward. Stanley’s eyes widened and he jumped to the left.

At the same time, he placed his sword horizontally next to him and carved a long wound on the side of the Crawler’s limb. Even as it pulled back its limb, he gathered up his strength and hacked at the limb as hard as he could.

He cut right at the tip of the limb as it pulled back, so the portion he cut off actually dropped to the ground next to him.

Stanley moved back just in case the tiny slice of the limb was dangerous, but to his surprise, the limb vanished, disappearing in a whiff of black smoke that spread around him, gone within the next few seconds.

Stanley frowned a bit when he saw that. He had heard that the Crawlers did indeed vanish when they were killed, but he hadn’t realized that the same happened to its cut-off body parts as well.

’Does the body part regenerate? If I continue hacking away at its body, can I possibly—’

An immense feeling of danger filled him instantly as he was able to tell, without even looking, that the Crawler’s limb was attacking him.

JUMP BACK!

That was the feeling he got. He immediately dashed backward as the limb landed when he had been, splashing the mud aside, and leaving a large dent in the ground itself.

Stanley tried to land on his feet, but he stepped on a stone and ended up tumbling backward, hitting his head hard on the ground.

"Argh!" he cried out in pain. He barely opened his eyes when he saw the limb come for him. Just before it reached him, a man came from the side and slammed into the limb, redirecting it to the side so Stanley wasn’t hurt.

"Kid! Stop being distracted," he said, as his stone armor started coming off. "One wrong move and you’ll lose your life."

The man continued staring at the monster while talking to Stanley. He was breathing a little too heavily, almost as if using his powers multiple times in a row was causing him a little too much trouble.

Stanley got back up. "Sorry," he apologized quickly. "I won’t get distracted again."

The man smiled. "I must say, you’re not bad, kid," he said. "You’re Bradley’s brother, right?"

"Yes," Stanley said.

"Haha, I can see that he must be very proud of you," the man said. "Alright, if you’re going to help, help properly. Don’t go in alone, or that will get you killed. You seem strong, stronger than us, so let’s fight together."

"Okay!" Stanley said.

"Good! I’ll distract it, you attack," the man said. "Let’s go."

The two of them moved at once, the man moving before Stanley. The moment he arrived close enough again, the monster went back to attacking.

The Crawlers seemed entirely mindless, working on nothing but the pure instinct to kill anything that moved.

It didn’t consider who was stronger or who was more dangerous. If it could attack someone, it would.

The man dodged to the side. Despite how far the Crawler was, if you knew it was going to attack, you could dodge it.

Stanley was already on the side, so the limb completely missed him as he arrived right next to it.

’Just the tip,’ he told himself and swung his sword as hard as he could. The sword was carved diagonally through the edge of the crawler’s limb, carving out another piece of it.

That piece too fell to the ground, vanishing in a black smoke.

"Move back!" the man ordered Stanley and he did just as told.

Only when the man was in front of him that he could act as a distraction for Stanley. He was already sure by now that he couldn’t use his technique more than twice now, and if he did, he would be so incredibly tired that he would have to leave the battlefield for his own safety.

As such, it was much better for him to do what he was doing. Be a distraction.

He dodged to the side, letting Stanley come in from the side and attack again. He couldn’t carve out anything, but his sword did go decently into the Crawler’s limb.

Compared to what Stanley could do, the other people’s attacks looked like papercuts to the man.

The other Defenders were fighting against the other limbs of the monster, while the ones that were capable of ranged attacks were targeting the main sphere of the monster, slowly chipping away at its life.

Stanley and the man together fought for at least 2 minutes straight, attacking the beast as much as they could.

As they fought and managed to hurt it more and more, they were all certain that the monster was close to its death. The rain had also stopped somewhat making it easy for them to continue fighting.

Stanley stabbed into the monster’s limb, dragging his sword to the side, and carving it open. He also cut off another piece, but only a small one.

He jumped back, getting ready to strike again. Despite fighting so much, he didn’t feel tired at all. His body was strong and so was his stamina.

The other man was tired too, but it seemed he could move just fine, so there was nothing to worry about.

He saw Crawler attack again, and as usual, Stanley ran forward just as the man dodged. However, right as he arrived, the mud splashed on him, some of which got into his eyes.

The place where the Crawler had attacked was a large puddle of mud it seemed.

Stanley swung the sword and hit the Crawler, but his eyes were closed and he couldn’t see anything.

He blinked rapidly, but it seemed quite a bit of mud had gotten into his eyes, which needed to be washed away.

The Crawler suddenly moved its limb back. Stanley moved backward and looked forward again. His eyes hurt from the dirt that had gotten into it, but at the moment, he couldn’t focus on the pain.

He needed to focus on the front, even if all he could get were glimpses between the blinking.

As he did, He noticed that the man was rubbing his eyes as well. The mud had gotten into his eyes as well.

"No, go back!" he shouted at the man, but it was too late. The Crawler whipped its limb from the side.

The man managed to use his technique at the last moment as stone armor covered him entirely. However, even then he was hit with a force that threw him into the air far away.

The man tumbled on the ground, his stone armor breaking into pieces as he was flung far. He only stopped about a hundred meters away when he slammed into a big piece of rock and his head struck the rock.

The man’s body slid down the rock the large patch of blood remained on the stone that everyone could see even from where they were.

There was no need to go check the man at all as everyone that had paid attention understood at that moment that the man had died.