Defiance of the Fall

His hope was that the monkeys would give up and go back to the valley , but he wouldn’t dare put his life on the line for it to be true . So he hesitantly ventured further into the cave to create some distance . His body was hurting all over but he wouldn’t let himself sit down , afraid that he wouldn’t be able to get back up in a short while if he did .

The caverns seemed to be a confusing maze of interconnected tunnels and chambers , and Zac saw no change after 30 minutes of slow walking . The caves weren’t completely pitch black at least , as there actually was growing moss on many of the walls which gave off some luminescence . He didn’t understand why they would create light , but he assumed that the moss was mutated by cosmic energy .

The tunnels were actually full of cosmic energy , almost at the level of the valley . The high concentration on the mountain peaks seemed to only be a result of some of the interior energy leaking out . It would be strange if something didn’t change with the subterranean flora if they were consistently bathed in cosmic energy of this magnitude .

Finally satisfied with the distance from the entrance he had created , he stopped in a quiet chamber which at least wasn’t completely dark due to the glowing moss . He sighed and thumped down on the ground with a grimace . It was pitch black apart from the blue scattered lights from the moss but he didn’t care . He did have a flashlight he had brought from the camper if he needed proper light , but he didn’t know how much charge the batteries still had . He instead brought out a Nexus Crystal from the pouch and started absorbing .

It didn’t help in healing his battered body , but it did help in recovering his depleted energy . Together with his amulet , he was absorbing energy at a great rate , and after only four hours he once again was full of cosmic energy .

That didn’t mean that he was in prime condition though . His head still hurt from overusing his Dao , and his body screamed in protest as soon as he moved slightly . He could only stay put for a bit longer in order for his Vitality to do its thing . He had nothing in his bag that could help against his wounds that were mainly blunt-force trauma as far as he knew . He did put some ointment on the burns from the herald though , even if he wasn’t sure whether aloe was effective against burns from magic monkey fire .

Finally done with everything he rested his back against the wall and sighed despondently . Today did not go according to plan .

Chapter 49 - Spelunking

Since Zac felt somewhat refreshed from absorbing the Nexus Crystal he held off on sleeping , and instead decided to take a quick glance at his status screen .

Name Zachary Atwood

Level 32

Class Hatchetman (F)

Race Human (F)

Alignment Human (Earth)

Titles Born for Carnage , Ultimate Reaper , Luck of the Draw , Giantsbane , Disciple of David , Overpowered , Slayer of Leviathans , Adventurer , Demon Slayer I , Full of Class , Rarified Being , Trailblazer , Child of Dao , The Big 500

Dao Seed of Heaviness - Early

Strength 164

Dexterity 59

Endurance 92

Vitality 69

Intelligence 49

Wisdom 49

Luck 67

Free Points 3

Nexus Coins 485286

The last few days had actually brought in almost all the coins he needed for the movement skill . Getting his skills and Dao boosts had increased his daily earnings tremendously . Of course he knew that this was the limit for now . The only targets more lucrative compared to the monkeys on the island were the demons and imps . But he held no illusion that he would be able to charge into 50 of them at a time and start a massacre as he had with the monkeys . He would be blasted to smithereens in no time .

Next , he opened up his quest menu to see the progress of his quest

Off With Their Heads (Unique) : Kill the four heralds and the general of an incursion within 3 months . Reward : 10 E-Grade Nexus Crystals , E-Grade equipment , unique building depending on performance . (2/5)

He was quite disappointed to see that the monkey king apparently survived the slash . Of course , there was the possibility that it wasn’t a Herald , but he felt that the chance of that to be quite slim .

He had gained a level right at the start of the pursuit , and he sensed he wasn’t far away from reaching level 33 either . It was a shame that the System didn’t provide the same type of service as many games , restoring both health and mana at the level up . Then he might have actually have had a chance of turning things around and finishing off the monkey king .

The whole experience was quite a let-down and the first real setback except constantly getting hurt . He constantly went over things he could have done differently in order to actually kill the monkey . But soon he threw those depressing thoughts out of his mind , as he knew he had to work with what he got , and try to continuously improve .