Chapter 71: Attack the Weak Point (1)
[Surveying will begin.]
Lloyd’s eyes widened. He looked at the message that popped right in front of him. He had his doubts. However, it was working. It truly worked.
Wow, I never expected this would work.
This wasn’t the time to be impressed. This wasn’t the time to ponder why on earth this skill worked on the monster. He could be impressed later. He wouldn’t miss out on anything if he analyzed why it worked later.
Right now, it’s time for me to make good use of it.
Ask later, use now. Lloyd focused on the message that popped right in front of him. His eyes moved rapidly.
Every spot his gaze touched turned into augmented reality. Every inch of the large Gigatitan’s body was scanned, analyzed, and turned into a data point in front of him. Lloyd felt like he was using a microscope to look over every single one of the Gigatitan’s pores.
Thanks to it, he was able to identify the secret behind the monster’s impressive defense power.
Okay, so the survey is done, and its shell is composed of… hmm, chitin and dentin.
It wasn’t a simple mix, however. The molecules were intricately structured like a triple-layered honeycomb. Those tripled-layered honeycomb structures were overlapped and woven into a helix. It looked just like a high-end bulletproof vest made of kevlar fiber.
What’s more, its average thickness is three feet.
The Gigatitan had naturally possessed a three-foot thick advanced bulletproof vest. That wasn’t the only secret behind its defensive capabilities.
There is a subtle wave pattern all over its shell, and it’s going in a unified direction.
The pattern mixed together and flowed toward its forehead, which had a giant protruding thorny horn.
Lloyd’s gaze sharpened.
That horn doesn’t look like a mere decoration.
His gaze sharpened all the more. The wave patterns were concentrated on the horn, but its inside was empty. Lloyd thought that there must be a reason it was there.
Surely, it can’t just be a piece of decoration. Maybe this will work as well. Design!
Lloyd activated his design skill. He also activated his skill options.
[Skill Option Three: Simulation mode has been activated.]
[The topographical data of the current virtual design will be available for simulation.]
The background of the virtual space brightened. A plethora of dots and lines floated and connected with one another, like a graphic composed of polygons. A large form appeared in the air.
It was the body of the Gigatitan that was just surveyed.
Okay, it works.
Lloyd’s glance traveled to the side. The Gigatitan was jumping all about to catch Javier. It synced perfectly with the one that floated in the simulation mode window.
Just perfect.
Lloyd lifted his two hands. He operated the simulation mode as he touched the air.
What I want to find out is the relationship between the wave patterns on its shell and the empty horn.
Lloyd zoomed in on the screen and focused on one part of the Gigatitan’s back.
Then, he bent his finger.
The power of physical impact I want to test is, uhm, about thirty tons.
Lloyd flicked, and the end of his index finger tapped the back side of the Gigatitan displayed in the simulation mode. A force of thirty tons, which Lloyd had just set, was applied.
Lloyd watched the direction of the waves of impact. A red shockwave was created at the center of the impact point. The impact failed to dig deep into the shell. Instead, it flowed and gathered along the wave patterns marked countless times on the surface. After that, it was concentrated on the thorn-shaped horn. Just then, the empty space inside the horn resonated.
This is it. The impact was resonating inside the empty space of the horn. That’s why most of the impact settles down into a vibration.
Lloyd’s eyes shone. Lloyd was naturally impressed. He felt like he had just witnessed a miracle of nature.
But now’s not the time for that.
He wasn’t surveying and designing right now to answer his curiosity. He needed to unearth the Gigatitan’s weak spot using his skills. Lloyd’s gaze became more hectic and tenacious.
Endure for just a little longer, Javier!
Lloyd wouldn’t have been able to use the skill on the monster if Javier hadn’t bought him some time. Knowing this very well, Lloyd ran an experiment on every part of the giant creature. He scanned for its physical characteristics and durability. At last, he was able to find what he was looking for.
There it is.
Narrowing his eyes, Lloyd focused on one point. It was the area that connected the carapaces eleven and twelve in between the space where the monster’s stomach led to its chest.
It’s not accurate to say chest and belly because the Gigatitan is not an insect, but who cares, that part is its greatest weakness.
The test had rendered such a result. It wasn’t that its shell was shallow. It was actually thicker than its back. But once it satisfied two conditions, it held the potential of being destroyed.
The horn and the attack angle. Those two factors are key.
They were the conditions that needed to be met to penetrate its shell. The first job was to get rid of the horn.
That’s how I’ll make sure the impact doesn’t disappear and goes through properly.
Erasing the detailed wave patterns on the shell surface was impossible, but the horn could be discarded. Once the horn was gone, the impact power that flowed along the wave patterns would not resonate through the horn. If it didn’t resonate, it would come back to the path it had followed.
The second condition was the angle. The connecting part between the carapaces eleven and twelve. Javier had to thrust from the tail to the head exactly at a forty-five-degree angle. Of course, the blow needed to be hard and mighty.
It will work if Javier uses the mana blast.
With those conditions in mind, Lloyd ran the test three times. Each ended in success. The mana blast had been strong enough to divide the granite bedrock. Penetrating the shell would be easy as long as the conditions are met. He was able to penetrate the dorsal nerve cord and various tissues at the same time.
It’s going to leave a critical hit. He can do it.
Lloyd turned off the simulation mode. He lifted up his head. He spotted Javier in the distance, who was losing out to the continuing attacks of the Gigatitan.
Lloyd sprinted in that direction, and about 200 yards away, he shouted at the top of his lungs, “Hey! Can you hear me?!”
Javier didn’t answer. It looked like he couldn’t hear him.
Oh, crap.
He didn’t want to move closer.
But at the same time, he feared that Javier might really die if he stayed like this. Lloyd bit his lips hard.
Ugh, this man and his damned hero syndrome! This is the reason why I never want to be the main character in a novel. No sense of reality whatsoever, seriously.
It was a mystery to Lloyd why Javier decided to fight head-on against such a monster. Why, Lloyd thought to himself, did he volunteer to fight for the strangers? Lloyd was honestly impressed by Javier’s spirit. At the same time, the fact that such a hero was his personal knight felt bitter like a cup of espresso.
Crap, really!
Resolved, Lloyd rushed forward. 150 yards… one hundred yards… Lloyd narrowed the distance between him and Javier. At last, he entered the shadow of the Gigatitan that heavily fell over him.
He shouted very loudly, “Hey! Dude!”
This time, he heard a response. The voice wasn’t a shout. It was soft and yet clear as if Javier had used his mana to speak.
“Master Lloyd?”
“Yeah! It’s me, you punk!”
“Do you plan to fight the monster with me?”
Lloyd seemed to catch a slight sense of gladness in his voice. Shuddering, Lloyd retorted, “Fight with you, my ass! Why would I do such a thing?!”
He paused for a second before continuing to speak.
“You’re all jittery because you can’t lay even a scratch on its shell no matter how much you slash and stab it, eh?”
“No.”
“No?”
“No, Young Master,” Javier said.
“Why?”
“I was attacking the horn first, not its body.”
“What…?”
Dazed, Lloyd lifted his head. The Gigatitan’s shadow fell over them, and Lloyd caught a glimpse of its head over its giant body. To Lloyd’s surprise, its horn was cut in half!
“This is just my gut feeling, but I feel like that horn is working to dissipate my blow. So, I intend to cut the horn first.”
“Wow.”
Javier’s voice was calm. But contrary to his composed voice, he moved like a storm. Seeing that, something struck Lloyd to his core.
This is what a true prodigy looks like.
Javier was truly different as he was set to become the one and only grandmaster in history. It had taken using the analysis and surveying skill for Lloyd to discover the monster’s weak spot. But Javier managed to pinpoint it in the process of fighting against it head-on.
“Then, did you also figure out that the monster has a weak spot on its belly?”
“No,” Javier replied, “I did not know that.”
“That’s why I am here!”
Lloyd shouted triumphantly. Whatever the case was, the only person who could drive into the weak spot was Javier. And so, it was imperative for Lloyd to tell him about its weak spot.
That was the only way for him and Javier to make it out of there alive. Lloyd’s shout was immediately returned with a response.
“I wish to hear more about it.”
Javier landed right beside Lloyd. He unilaterally stretched out his hands.
“So please excuse me for a moment,” he added.
“Eh?”
Javier grabbed Lloyd by the back of his neck and jumped off the ground. The movement made Lloyd feel like he was riding on top of a high-speed train.
Lloyd snapped his eyes open. His feet felt detached from the ground. The ground swooshed past him at that moment. The stormy noise of the wind beat his ears. Lloyd couldn’t lift his head because of the mighty wind. Right above him was the Gigatitan, attacking them!
The rocks in the cliffs were being destroyed and crumbling, and the shards fell from the sky like rain. Javier charged forth like a storm in between. Dangling in the air like a popsicle wrapper, Lloyd shrieked when he was being hoisted in the air only by Javier’s grip on his collar.
“Aaack! Hey!! What’s this? Do you have something against me?!!”
“Yes, I do. Why ask such an obvious question.”
“Please be more specific about the monster’s weak spot.”
“Argh! Can we talk after you let go?”
“I’m doing this because I’m nervous that I’ll mishear if I stay far from you.”
“Aaack! Dammit!”
Javier kept drastically shifting their direction and moving faster.
Striving hard to not vomit, he shouted, “It’s just what I explained to you a while ago! It’s the space between the carapaces eleven and twelve that connects the chest and belly. Do you see that?”
“Yes, I can.”
“From the tail to the head! Stab the center point at a forty-five-degree angle! Use your mana blast!”
“Will that work?”
“Probably. But you have to cut that horn first!”
“Yes, Young Master.”
Javier didn’t inquire where Lloyd got the information. He didn’t have the time to waste his time on trivial questions. Right now, they needed to trust each other.
“Then please stay here.”
Javier finally let go of his grasp after he landed. Lloyd’s nape, which was continually shackled, was finally liberated. Javier leaped once again.
With that, Lloyd was left alone in between the rocks of the coastal cliff. He stared at the back of Javier, who was going back to hurtle toward the Gigatitan. Afterward, he thought to himself. Regardless of when he saw it, Javier’s combat style was an art form.
One of the Gigatitan’s feet stomped on the ground. It meant to aim at Javier, who was charging forward. He was already gone as he had leaped high. He was actually “flying,” using the Gigatitan’s leg as a spring.
He kicked the pillar-like leg and shot up like a flash of light. Then, he used his sword to whack another leg joint that tried to block his movement, leaving the repulsion power of the weapon’s aura to take control of his body.
The impact made him fly out sideways, and he used the mana blast downward. After slightly getting elevated, he gave his body a twist. Five appendages of the Gigatitan rushed toward him all at once, but he simply slid past and avoided them. When he finally climbed up its back, he sprinted forward.
Javier quickly charged toward the monster’s head like a gust of wind or a lightning bolt coming down from the sky. Before the Gigatitan could shake its body, Javier leaped in the air and transferred his energy to his sword. It was added along with the rotation power as he twisted to the right midair.
He brandished his sword and gave a slash. The area he stabbed had already received dozens of hits in the same angle and direction. His blade shone coldly and dug right into the spot again. Right as the blade seemed to brush past the horn…The horn was cut off the Gigatitan’s forehead.
“Grrrrrr!”
The Gigatitan, now infuriated, flung its body toward Javier. However, Javier had already landed and shifted his direction. As the monster charged ahead in a fury, the whole ground was overturned.
Javier, having closely avoided the attack, sprinted. He stepped only on the peak of the protruded and overturned ground. His eyes glimmered again.
Right over there.
He spotted the weak point Lloyd had shown him. Moving as swiftly as the wind, he jumped right into the large body of the Gigatitan.
Got it.
Javier needed to be at a forty-five-degree angle from the monster’s head. Keeping that in mind, he fixed his sword high. He created a collision from the mana circles and pointed his sword. Mana blast. Right before the blast could dig into the Gigatitan’s weakness…
Out of nowhere, Javier was swept over by the powerful storm from the left. It was the Gigatitan’s forearm.
“Tsk!”
Javier redirected the direction of the blast by reflex toward the rushing forearm. The two powers, the strong forearm club and the powerful mana blast, crashed together in the air.
Javier’s body was sent flying by the explosion. His body took a nosedive and got stuck in the ground.
“Argh!”
His foot dug into a rock. But he didn’t have any time to waste.
The forearm club struck down again much more fiercely than it did previously. Javier immediately jumped, but the rock became crushed to dust. Javier then attempted a counterattack amid the sandstorm of broken rocks. He laser-focused on the Gigatitan’s weak spot. The monster was doggedly protecting its weak spot. This was a fight between the silver-haired knight, who was about to become a sword master, and a monster that was the size of a high-rise building. The two gave their all fighting each other.
Lloyd was about one hundred yards away, watching the battle.
Ha, he’ll lose at this rate.
Lloyd thought that Javier would die if he left him alone. So, it was harder for Lloyd to give up and leave now. For some reason, he thought he needed to do something to make sure that Javier would be able to attack the thing’s weak spot.
So today, my job is to draw its attention here.
Drawing attention. He needed to bait the monster. Lloyd wondered what would be the best way to do so. He turned his head. He looked around. Just then, the city district of Cremo appeared in his view. In the corner of the plaza, Lloyd vaguely took a glimpse of the mermaid statue stuck in the spire.
That was what got the Gigatitan to frenzy in the first place, right?
After the mermaid statue was thrown toward the city, the monster ended up treading into the land to lay another attack. What would, Lloyd wondered, happen if the mermaid statue started happily dancing in front of the Gigatitan?
His eyes wouldn’t be on Javier.
Lloyd chuckled. He remembered one of the most important rules he had learned by playing video games in Korea. What was the best way to draw attention? It was to pester and annoy his opponent until they insulted his gameplay.