Zac sat perched on a branch in a large tree eating an apple he had foraged earlier. The tree was one of the few in the vicinity that still stood tall and unaffected by the corrosive effect of the incursion, and its dense branches provided natural insulation from prying eyes. He had chosen this tree to be his temporary shelter to spend the night yesterday.
He had spent two nights close to the incursion now, trying to gain as much information as possible. Yesterday he had kept scouting around the demon city and up toward the mountain.
He had made some interesting discoveries. First of all, he had realized how the third skill quest progressed. It was based on time. It seemed that he had to be out in the forests fighting roughly 18 hours for the quest to progress by 1 point. That meant that he had to spend most of his time awake fighting every day. He didn’t mind though, as he was planning on doing that anyway.
But it also meant that it would be an extremely close shave to actually manage to complete it before the 2-month deadline. He had already decided he didn’t dare to wait, he’d kill at least the two remaining heralds as soon as possible. He didn’t want to repeat what happened with Vul, being incapacitated and missing his deadline due to waiting until the last moment. He needed time to recuperate in case he got hurt from the fights.
He had also found the fourth type of beasts that the demons had brought through the portal. They were magic monkeys. Or rather they were called Stone Monkeys by his [Eye of Discernment], and did not look quite as demonic as the other three animals.
They were roughly up to his chest in height but had a bulkier build. They were an anthracite grey and surprisingly no fur. Instead, it looked that they had plates of rocks covering most parts of their bodies, forming almost a natural armor. The aspect that made them look somewhat demonic was their shining red eyes.
The stone monkeys were the most well-rounded of all the demon beasts so far. The barghest was all brawn and no brain, the gwyllgi high speed but low strength, and the imps were incredibly dangerous but also incredibly frail.
The stone monkeys were strong, agile and also durable. Even more annoyingly they seldom moved alone. They seemed to be united in one large group, and Zac suspected that the fourth Herald was the pack leader. He hadn’t seen it, however, as he didn’t dare venture too far into the mountains as it was crawling with monkeys.
That meant that the final Herald apart from the monkey was either a juiced up gwyllgi or imp, depending on which of the two he had managed to kill with his lucky roll for survival. He wasn’t sure which he preferred to be alive, as both felt like they’d be a pain in the ass to fight.
It seemed that the monkeys stayed in the mountain due to their affinity with rocks. Zac often saw them perched and completely immobile on outcroppings as though they were gargoyle sculptures. Their natural habitat was likely in mountainous regions back at their home planet.
He had been happy to notice that each stone monkey gave a lot of Nexus Coins upon killing them. However, he still would rather farm the less lucrative barghest after his only encounter with the monkeys.
Zac thought he had finally managed to single out a solitary stone monkey. It was far away from any demon activity and seemed to be randomly walking around close to the foot of the mountain. Zac had planned to fight it to test it out.
What followed had truly exceeded his expectations. As soon as the monkey noticed Zac it didn’t try to fight. Instead, it screeched at the top of its lungs and started fleeing back up the mountain. While it was faster than a normal human, it still was no match for Zac.
Within a few seconds he had caught up to it, and a brief struggle erupted. The monkey’s fighting style was a full-on brawl, and it was a whirlwind of punches and kicks in a disorganized and confusing manner. It also had a pair of sharp teeth which it tried using when an opportunity arose.
Zac estimated the Strength of the beast to be somewhere in the 60’s, almost on par with Zac’s before he got his class. Its other stats were quite good across the board, even its intelligence seemed higher compared to Earth’s normal primates.
Of course, even with its strong stats, it was no match against Zac. He had grabbed an arm with his free hand and threw the monkey down on the ground. A quick swing and it was dead. The stone plating on the monkeys was quite hard but offered little resistance to his weapon.
The problems came after. The screech of the monkey had pulled a swarm of his brethren over, who all had seemed extremely enraged upon seeing their fallen comrade.
Thus Zac had been beset by an avalanche of angry fists and kicks coming in from all directions. Every swing of his axe had maimed or killed a monkey, but they were endless and fearless. Finally he had escaped, only because the monkeys seemed loath to leave the mountain and enter the forest. They had stopped right at the foot of the mountain, angrily roaring at Zac.
Zac was completely exhausted by then, both physically and his cosmic energy. Even new and improved pathways had barely managed to sustain him in his escape. He wasn’t sure that he’d make it out if that onslaught had started a bit further up the mountain. He’d be drained and then finished off.
The upside from that experience was that it had been the most efficient farming of currency and cosmic energy he had ever done, except from when he killed the heralds. In that free-for-all brawl, he had gained a level and over 10 000 Nexus coins. He wasn’t sure about how many he had actually killed during the escape, but it seemed that the monkeys each awarded around 350 to 400 nexus coins.
The individual gain wasn’t at the level of the imps, but there was a horde of monkeys but only a scant few imps from what he had seen so far. Of course, there still were many locations on the island he still hadn’t ventured to, and they might be a cluster of imps somewhere.
If the monkeys weren’t so territorial and had such teamwork, he’d never want to leave the mountain again. He’d gain enough Nexus Coins to buy the movement skill [Steps of Gaia] in no time. But he deemed it too large a risk to farm these beasts, at least for now. He would have to venture up the mountain again soon though, as the Herald was probably hidden somewhere in there, maybe in the form of a monkey king.
He’d wait until he had his class skills first until he ventured back into the mountains.
He had also figured out the general composition of the demon forces. He estimated that there were somewhere around 5 000 demons on the island in total. Their current activities could generally be divided into three parts.
The first part was the construction of a giant palace in the middle of the town. It still wasn’t finished, but Zac was amazed by the design even before seeing the finished product. It looked like medieval eastern architecture had been fused with nature. The structure was made both from stone and trees.
And by trees, he didn’t mean chopped down lumber, but actual trees. There were dozens of mages that reminded Zac of the root mage he had killed, who grew large black trees out of the ground. They then somehow forced it to grow in shapes that would constitute rooms and walls. It took less than an hour for a few mages to grow one of the house-trees into its final size. There were also mages who summoned rocks out of the ground. Under their care the rocks seemed like clay, allowing the mages to form them to their will to form a natural feeling to the walls and other stone features.
The palace was only three stories tall at the highest point, but it was expansive, featuring multiple buildings, beautiful gardens, sky wells, and courtyards. The gracefully curved roofs were made with tiles, with their eaves hanging out a few meters from the structures. The most central building in the complex had two layers of eaves, giving it an even grander feeling. Zac supposed that was either the general’s living quarters or some type of throne room. Surrounding it all was a black hedge roughly 2 meters tall. It felt decorative rather than providing any protection, as anyone would easily get through or above it.
The only thing that took away from the grand structure was the dull colors. The palace was mostly in shades of black and grey, giving it a very foreboding feeling. The only flashes of color were splotches of red in some details, the shade reminding him of the shining pillar.
The second group moved back and forth between the town and a cave in the mountain. He wasn’t exactly sure what they were doing there, as they held no equipment or the like when moving. They likely had magic pouches just like him, obscuring any hint of what was going on inside. He didn’t dare sneak in, as there seemed to be activity inside the cave at all times.
His two guesses were they either were mining, or there was some sort of huge area beneath that they explored. He hadn’t seen anyone hurt or wounded when walking back from the cave at least, so it shouldn’t be full of subterranean monsters at least.
The last group, and also the smallest, was small parties heading out of the town and in different directions of the island. They looked like small search parties, but not like the ones he had encountered so far.
It seemed that the demons had learned their lessons from their two missing groups, and had improved the power of the parties. They all held at least five demons, but that wasn’t all. Accompanying them was a varied amount of beasts. They all had a few Gwyllgi running around to the front and the sides for the party, seemingly acting as scouts. There was also a couple of barghest that moved in the front, filling the role of meat shields. A few parties even had an imp or two subserviently following the demons.
Zac felt like he was no match for a party like this, there were too many variables and things that could damage him at the same time. He hadn’t tried fighting those parties, staying far away as possible. Now that he knew what he was up against, he realized he really only had one advantage.
He knew a lot about them, but for them, he was still an enigma.