Tier 3+ - Accidental Champion (Book 6) - Chapter 19 - Talk About Ominous

[Patch Note: Previously, I mistakenly said Xavier updated Farscope from 100-foot radius to 1,000-foot radius, while originally it had been 100-metre radius.

I’ve changed this to updated to 1,000-metre radius, which is what I had in my head. I’m Australian and I’m used to metric, I just accidentally put feet in there. Sorry about any confusion that might have caused!]

Xavier dodged the different tentacles of the C Grade, Level 399 Demon of the Depths that had just burst free from the ice beneath the tower at the mountain’s peak on the Thirty-First Descent while he read through the System’s description.

He had been hoping the description would give him more information. It didn’t say what kind of spells the demon might be able to cast, nor did it say what its weaknesses were.

And if the System was getting personal with its descriptions, as Xavier had been suspecting, then that last bit at the end was incredibly unnerving.

If you stumble into this beast’s domain, remember that you have lived a good life, and that all lives must one day end.

Talk about ominous.

Xavier  pulled up, flying high above the beast. The massive tentacle-mouths followed him. They smashed into one another, jockeying for position, knocking the other out of the way. It was a strange sight, but at least it meant the description rang true about them each having a mind of their own.

The damned things stretched farther then he’d imagined. The air thinned more and more as Xavier climbed higher in his flight, until finally he flew through a patch of clouds.

The tentacle-mouths didn’t reach quite that far.

Xavier was about to simply hover there and wait the next two seconds until his cores were no longer blocked. But despite the fact that he couldn’t see through the clouds with his natural eyesight, he could see the tentacle-mouths clear as day with his Farscope ability.

They were glowing—casting spells.

Simultaneously…

If this is all one big beast, how can each of those damned tentacle-mouths be casting a spell?

Xavier knew he wasn’t about to find an answer to that question. He also knew it didn’t matter—all that mattered was that it was happening.

Great big shards of ice shot out from the throats of the tentacle-mouths like massive spears shot from ballistae.

Xavier dodged each of the different shards in the air. He could use Soul Block, but that seemed like a mistake—using Soul Block now would mean he wouldn’t be able to use it again for five minutes.

Five seconds had now passed since Xavier had activated the trap beneath the ice, and he could access his cores again. He was starting to feel like this descent was supposed knock whoever came to it out if they weren’t prepared enough. He’d thought the Amalgamons were a massive jump in strength versus the Monstrosities of the previous descent. And the fact that it had teleported him to a different world…

Then this trap.

A trap that blocked him out of using his cores for five seconds—meaning he couldn’t cast a spell while he was initially avoiding the massive Demon of the Depths as it broke free of the ice…

Couple that with a five-minute block to his cooldowns? What kind of trap was this?

Not only that, but it had also dispelled all of Xavier’s active spells. The portal he’d been keeping active all this time was gone, and—more importantly—the time dilation field he’d had active was no longer there.

And he wouldn’t be able to cast Time Alteration again for almost five minutes.

Perhaps Xavier should have asked that C Grade party for advice about the next descents of the Hell Moon before moving forward.

Xavier flew as fast as he could. The ice-spears were coming at him at an amazingly swift rate. Evasion gained a rank as he dodged one after another, sweat dotting his brow, the muscles in his wings aching as he pushed them harder than ever.

No point holding back against this thing.

Xavier cast his most powerful spell—and he used every single one of the souls in his soulkeeping reserve to do it. By now, he had many thousands.

Soul Apparitions burst into life.

Thousands of them flying through the sky. All the souls of demons that he’d reaped from the previous descents. Like an army of ghosts surging straight down toward the Demon of the Depths.

Now that the ice had broken, Xavier was able to see beneath it with Farscope. Before the trap had activated and the beast had burst free, that had been blocked from him.

But even this high, with his 1,000-metre radius upgrade of Farscope, he could see the body of the Demon of the Depths. The bulk of it, like in iceberg, was still beneath the frozen water. Only its tentacle-mouths had shot upward to attack him.

It was the biggest beast Xavier had ever encountered. Its body was a disgusting, pulsing, massive mass of black bulbous, shifting skin. It looked like a million bugs were crawling inside of it, the way that skin kept moving. Xavier shuddered at the very sight of the thing.

And that wasn’t all—the tentacle-mouths that were constantly firing those ice-spears that Xavier frantically dodged weren’t the only mouths this beast possessed. It had hundreds of them, opening and closing around its massive body. Every single one of them had those sword-long, needle-sharp teeth.

He watched for the health bar to appear.

Thousands of Soul Apparitions surged down at the Demon of the Depths. They flew through it, causing no physical damage whatsoever—but they went straight for the beast’s soul.

Xavier imagined he would easily be able to one-shot the Amalgamons with this spell. Hell, he was pretty sure he could have taken the entire 240 beasts that had been up here with Soul Strike as well.

And yet he had no idea if it would be enough to kill this one enemy.

Back when he’d fought the Elemental Dragon, Soul Strike alone hadn’t been enough.

But Xaiver was more powerful now than he had been back then. Considerably more powerful. Now only was he now Level 243, he’d gained thirty 1,000 clear titles—adding up to 3,000 more points to all of his stats.

This beast may be the most powerful thing he’d ever faced at Level 399, but it wasn’t B Grade. And something told Xavier it couldn’t be near as powerful as the C Grades he’d just been training with.

The demon’s health bar appeared. Xavier watched it as the soul damage carved through the red.

Xavier blinked.

Soul Strike hadn’t killed the beast—but it had caused it 80 percent damage.

He didn’t know whether to be impressed with himself or further terrified of just how powerful this damned thing was. A Soul Strike like that most certainly would have killed him.

Only 20 percent health remaining. I can take this damned thing.

Xavier didn’t relent. He instantly cast Soul Shatter down at the beast. As an area-of-effect attack, he knew it wouldn’t do a tremendous amount of damage—and it certainly wouldn’t be able to harm it as much as Soul Strike it.

I might have to resort to using Soul Energy.

That was something he was trying not to do. If he truly needed to, he would. But if Xavier were going to get the 1,000 clear for this floor, he needed to use something that he could regain much faster than he could his Soul Energy.

The Soul Shatter spell struck the Demon of the Depths—but it only shaved off a mere 1 percent of the beast’s health. And it would be several minutes before he would be able to use the spell again.

How can this beast be so much more powerful than the Level 370 Amalgamons?

His mind couldn’t help but work on that problem. Perhaps… Perhaps this was beast was closer to what a True C Grade’s power might be. As powerful as Xavier was, he had to remember he was still only D Grade. And just like there were Denizens that were more powerful than others of the same grade, he knew there were beasts that were like that too.

As Xavier flew, a great silver glow surrounded the Demon of the Depths. It flashed faster than he could blink, and suddenly a torrent of ice shards shot up from the beast’s hundreds of mouths.

If the tentacle-mouths had been like ballistae firing spears at him, then this was like several machine guns firing bullets at a super-fast rate.

A rate that he simply wasn’t swift enough to dodge.

Body Cultivation, unlike his other spells, didn’t have a cooldown—he’d been able to recast it five seconds after that damned trap had blocked his cooldowns for five-minutes.

Celestial Energy reinforced his skin, but he still didn’t want to risk getting hit by those damned things.

Xavier grinned as he could see the ice-shards shooting up toward him.

Though his cooldowns were blocked, he could use any spell that hadn’t been cooling down when the trap had been activated. And, despite the fact that he’d had a portal active, he’d actually cast that Portal spell before he’d cast Time Alteration—all the way back when he’d been facing the first group of Amalgamons he’d encountered.

Unlike some of his other spells, his Portal spell began to cooldown the instant it was cast. So, even if he had a portal active, he could cast another portal once the spell had cooled down.

It just took a bit more concentration and energy to juggle having them all active.

Which meant Xavier was able to cast Portal.

He created the largest portal that he could manage. The twin portal appeared above the Demon of the Depths, angled straight at it.

Hundreds of ice-spears from the tentacle-mouths, along with thousands of ice-shards from the mouths attached directly to the Demon of the Depths’ body, were sailing toward Xavier when he’d cast this spell—and every single one of them went through the portal he’d just created.

The ice-spears and ice-shards rained down on the Demon of the Depths, sticking into its body and making it look like some demented porcupine.

The demon writhed. Hundreds of roars and squeals of pain were unleashed from every single one of its mouths—even the tentacle-mouths screamed. The noise, even as high up as Xavier was, even as powerful as his ears were, was deafening, like an attack in itself.

Something dripped from his ears. He felt it slide down his cheek.

Blood.

Xavier watched as the beast’s health dipped and dipped and dipped. It reached 15 percent… 10 percent… 5 percent…

The deafening noise stopped, but the demon still screamed—Xavier could see it. The noise was replaced with a ringing sound. It had broken his eardrums. At least they would heal.

The Demon of the Depths’ health bar went all the way to one before a brilliant white light burst from the beast. A light bright enough that Xavier thought it would have blinded him if he were looking at it with his actual eyes.

What the hell was that?

Xavier’s eyes widened as he saw the demon’s health bar—

It had sprung all the way back up to 50 percent.

Whatever that damned spell was—that flash of brilliant light—the moment the demon’s health had hit 1 percent it had activated, healing it by half.

Xavier had been this close to killing the Demon of the Depths—and with the use of only three spells.

Now, his most powerful spell had been exhausted, and something told him the demon wouldn’t be shooting projectiles through his portal again.

Xavier just hovered there in the air for a long moment, his massive wings slowly flapping as they kept him aloft above the clouds. He took a deep breath, taking stock of what had just happened. His ears were still ringing, but as the demon was no longer screaming, he could feel them slowly healing.

The massive, long tentacles retreated back to the ground near their icy waters. For a moment, Xavier thought the beast would slink back down into the depths. But it didn’t.

The tentacles reached out to the very sides of the body of water.

Xavier’s eyes widened—the demon was pulling itself free.