Despite his preparations, the humans were in no rush to face the monsters. After all, the centipede was still a long distance away, and it was only due to the creature's massive bulk that Lev could spot it.

Summoning his communication tablet, he sent some mana into it and contacted Drakys.

"We've just exited into the open," Lev said once the connection was established. "I already see a third-threshold monster. Permission to hide some or all of my aura?"

"You see one immediately after getting past the first hill?" Drakys asked, not answering for now.

"Correct."

"Has it noticed you?"

"The centipede is only stirring for now. I don't doubt that we will be detected soon."

"Hmm," came the short message, followed by another after a few seconds. "Alright, collect your aura into your body, and let out half of it if nothing attacks you for three hours."

"Yes, sir."

Following the instructions, Lev pulled back his aura into his body, much to the relief of everyone present. The platinum hunters were mostly used to it by now, but the workers were always hyper aware of the presence amongst them. To be freed of it was like taking off additional weights from their body.

Blame Drakys, not me, he thought to himself, feeling a few gazes on his back. Only two of them felt somewhat accusatory, though everyone quickly prepared themselves for battle.

Before reaching the giant monster, many more were already slithering towards the carts. Now in the open, all of the monsters were visible from a long distance, and the workers manning the cannons made use of that. A single order was enough to call them all on top of the carts, where every cannon was currently being put to use.

Loud thumps were heard with each impact as shells landed on the ground, most of them missing or dodged by the slippery monsters. It turned out that the monsters were also hampered by the narrow space in the previous road, and Lev had to take things more seriously after taking in their advance.

Little wonder they seemed too weak. The wind armor is also supposed to aid their movements, which it couldn't really do after they just burst out of the walls.

On the ground, though, the centipedes were almost gliding forward. Given the quick reaction times and keen senses of monsters, more and more of his cannon shots were being evaded, forcing him to take action quicker when the number of centipedes continued to swell.

The first thing he powered up was his new and improved disks. Half as tall as him, each of them was deceptively thin and sharpened to the extreme. When he streamed mana into their enchantments, the constructs became way deadlier, their sharpness better than his previous version of Stargazer.

However, since they were meant to be a secondary means of offense, there were only a dozen of them, all of which he sent flying with a mental nudge. Spinning fast enough to easily cut through air resistance, he had to slow their speed when they traveled too fast to control properly.

Before the monsters could realize the danger, all of the disks descended before flying parallel to the ground. The centipedes didn't back down, sending blades of wind at the disks to destroy them.

Lev didn't try to avoid the attacks. Instead, he let the disks fly straight into them and observed the results.

Perception stretched to the limit, he watched with interest as the sharp attacks collided. The barrier disks sheared through the wind attacks at a surprising cost, slowing down in the process. Even if each of them had survived mostly unscathed, Lev still had to give another small burst of mana to his disks to bring them to their previous potency.

When they neared the monsters, he had to control them manually, not trusting his willpower to handle the task properly. It still needed to be trained for this particular construct, something he could do later.

For now, he predicted the admittedly straightforward trajectory of the monsters and intercepted them with his disks. Unsurprisingly, they only left cleanly cut chunks of centipedes in their wake.

[

You have slain [Ripper Centipede - Level 310]

You have slain [Ripper Centpiede - Level 308]

…

]

Five of the monsters were left alive for the others, which they killed admirably. Some of the cannon shots also found their mark, and before long, another wave of centipedes was coming after the carts. It was only a matter of time until the big one also detected them, and Lev was determined to make sure that nothing else disturbed them during that particular fight.

Test one is a success, he thought to himself, and waited for the next group of monsters. Still safe from the big one, another wave of centipedes rushed them not long after, at which point he had already prepared the next thing.

Seven orbs hovered above him, all of them enchanted with a simple feature. Lightning mana was constantly streamed into them, primed to be blasted with in a chain reaction.

Too spread out, he frowned and flew up, attracting a majority of the centipedes. Dashing away from the cart, he kept the orbs arrayed in front of him, and when the centipedes were sufficiently clumped together, blew up the constructs.

The test was straightforward. Lev aimed the orbs to remain in a mostly straight line, extending from left to right. The leftmost orb exploded first as its enchantments guided the explosion, causing it to expand towards the right.

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When the blast reached the nearest orb, that one also exploded, before the process was repeated seven times in a crackling chain of explosions.

Each blast was uniquely empowered by the previous one because of his class skills. When the wave of lightning from the first orb reached the second, a significant portion of it was absorbed and funneled into the next explosion. By the time the final orb exploded, a blast matching its potency was already flying towards it, and the final burst was about half again as strong as it was supposed to be.

I mean, sort of a success? Lev wondered with a slight smile, watching as the remaining monsters were taken down. The jump in power is definitely significant, but I'm not sure if I can afford this type of empowerment.

All in all, it was an interesting feature that he could potentially deploy in his cannons. For now, it was already really strong, but maybe such an addition would become possible in the future.

"Boss," Melvine called out, even though she didn't need to. In the distance, a few kilometers away, the third-threshold centipede's head rose to the sky, looking at the puny humans with its large eyes. The moment it realized what they were, its huge mandibles clacked together loud enough to produce a gale before it screeched.

Lev was prepared for that and quickly deployed his prepared sound ward, one divided amongst several shields. A large amount of mana was dumped into the enchantments to overload them, which just barely managed to resist the incoming sonic wave.

I need a better option for defending against sound attacks, he noted, and shoved the thought to the back of his mind. Stargazer was prepared and held tightly as the monster approached, though he had something else to test first.

Curbing his excitement, Lev quickly flew to his bubble and aimed the cannon. Given the bulk of the monster, that job wasn't particularly difficult. The real problem was that the immense amount of mana he channeled into the cannon was immediately detected, at which point Melvine finally made a move.

Around her, the world slowed. A cold breeze suddenly blew through the area, making the humans flinch away in surprise. Within seconds, a misty zone took form around the warrior, which she commanded to fly at the approaching monster's wind blades.

Perhaps calling them wind blades was disrespectful. The large attacks radiated wind mana as they tore through the air, vanishing into the cold mist. Melvine wasn't expecting to block them with just that and summoned a greatsword, which she swung horizontally towards the approaching projectiles.

Immediately, the remaining mist warped, turning into mana slashes of an element Lev had never seen before. He didn't stop to ponder either, as his cannon was already charged up after eating a third of his pool.

Once again, the launch went without any trouble, devouring the distance between the carts and the centipede slithering closer. The pure bright yellow beam landed on its head too quickly for the monster to dodge, though he couldn't see anything else because of the resulting explosion.

Instead of waiting for the results, he and Melvine cranked up their respective enhancements and rushed the monster while it was disoriented. A baleful screech washed away the cloud of flames, revealing the extent of the damage his beam had dealt.

On top of the monster's head, a long, charred gash was visible. The initial impact had landed next to its right mandible, which was bleeding profusely.

Not bad, Lev noted, filling Stargazer with lightning mana. Not that great, either. I suppose it's a valuable tool regardless, as long as I aim for vulnerabilities or simply use it to create openings.

Putting the cannon out of his mind, he flew higher and higher, well past the centipede's lunging range. Melvine didn't care about it all, her speed picking up rapidly. Within seconds, she was running faster than he could fly, stepping into the monster's range.

The centipede rose high up and dove, missing the warrior who dashed away. Instead of slamming into the ground, the monster parted it without trouble, smoothly borrowing inside.

Expecting that outcome, Melvine rushed its body that was quickly vanishing underground, her misty zone following the large blade. A decent amount of mana was imbued in it, turning the sword's metal a bright blue, not dissimilar to packed ice.

While Lev fired his prepared lightning slash towards the end of the centipede's body, she accurately slashed at one of the gaps between the monster's body segments. Despite the speed at which the centipede was burrowing, she found her mark with excellent precision, and the results were enough to surprise even Lev.

The ground suddenly shook as the monster roared in pain, and it wasn't hard to see why. All the blood that burst out of Melvine's cut froze solid mid-air, making the monster stagger. Unfortunately for it, the sudden pause also let the lightning slash fall on one of the gaps, blowing through the monster's armor and digging deep inside.

Oh, it's coming back. Lev channeled more mana into his glaive and glanced behind him, where the carts were still rushing ahead without stopping. The trained horses knew not to near the monster and were taking a wide detour to go around the battlefield and return to the road.

Several dozen meters of the ground around Melvine started vibrating rapidly, and he debated grabbing her with a rope and pulling her away. The warrior was aware of the approaching monster, however, and the constantly rising density of frozen mist around her showed no signs of stopping.

When the centipede was close enough for Lev's Mana Perception to accurately track it, she finally moved. A powerful leap let her dodge the monster's maw by a calculated hair's breadth, at which point she funneled all the mist into her sword again.

This time, the slash cut deep into the back of the monster's head as it exited the ground. The centipede's movements became jerky, almost halting in place. No doubt, the ice had frozen something vital in its head, turning it into a perfect target for Lev's next attack.

For a while now, he could feel that Crescent Decimation was close to evolving. It just needed that one last push to break through the threshold, one he had discovered already but couldn't execute properly. The last push was going to require some preparation.

Or, well, it would've if Melvine hadn't just offered it to him on a silver platter. Blue fire and lightning shone brightly in Stargazer's large blade, struggling to break out of his control.

Lev didn't let it and instead shaped the mana slash like he had done against the hound. Back then, given the stakes of that impromptu spar, he had accomplished it rather easily. Now, however, the same move took all of his brainpower and willpower, just barely thinning into a compressed, sharp slash of destructive mana.

With a strained grunt, he swung Stargazer in a simple chop, letting the slash fly directly at the monster's head. The crescent attack was as thin as two of his fingers, several times taller than himself. It left a trail of lightning and fire in its wake as the skill quickly lost cohesion, yet most of it remained stable by the time it landed on the monster.

The centipede tried to free itself, struggling with all its might. It almost bobbed out of the way even through the lethargy, just not quickly enough.

Melvine was already running as the Mana Slash sheared through the monster's wind armor. The chitin underneath exploded from the physical power, leaving the fleshier body completely exposed.

Like an executioner's axe, the slash tore through all resistance, cleaving the centipede in two as it went. A third of its visible bulk was cut through before the mana became fully unstable, blowing up while being lodged inside the lethal wound.

Lev watched with wide eyes as the upper portion of the ripper was torn away, gruesomely separated by the explosion. The rest of it, that was still above ground, was burnt and mangled, but no additional burst followed, meaning the core was probably still intact.

Well, damn. Didn't think it would be that strong, Lev mused and descended once the fires cleared. Some lightning remained, stubbornly clinging to the mist formed by Melvine's skills. It was another thing he was really interested in, as he was sure that it was a higher element now. Not as strong as Shadow perhaps, but enough so to freeze a third-threshold monster.

That warranted respect, and he was suitably awed as he lowered, ignoring the notifications for now, to find and harvest the core.

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