A Black Market LitRPG

As much as Kyle wanted to rush into the fray immediately, he needed to take a slight breather first, chugging down a water bottle before resting for a minute, his eyes darting around the area whilst coming up with an attack plan.

However, he could see a group of mineral ants in the distance numbering more than a dozen charging at him. Weird. Why are they aiming at me when they should be focusing their efforts on the large rock spiders?

Kyle decided to evade to the left, intending to pull them away from Feldon when he soon realised that they were heading straight to Feldon instead, wings beating furiously as their maws clicked incessantly.

Turning around, Kyle rushed back towards Feldon, flanking the mineral ants who were beginning to assault the screaming Feldon. Feldon clutched on tightly to the handle of the Thunder Blade, parrying lunge after lunge while Kyle swung his warhammer and crushed them all with ease.

Feldon was now coated in gooey mushy innards, along with bits and fragments of the mineral ant’s armour shell that clung to him like confetti. Kyle immediately walked right up to Feldon, checking his body and clothes visually. “What did you take from the outcrop?”

“Huh? Nothing…?” Feldon’s eyes shifted slightly, looking around for something to divert the topic to.

“Don’t try. The mineral ants are obviously gunning for you. What’s that in your pocket?”

“Nothing, nothing at all… HEY, STOP IT’S MINE!”

Kyle pulled out an amazing stone that was embedded with what seemed like a thousand red crystals in an organic formation, the entire stone being translucent and allowing one to view the interior, a veritable maze of dazzling light.

Is the entire crystal outcrop made of this? The outcrop seemed eerily similar to the glass cores that the rock spiders had internally, and with the mineral ants gnawing so ferociously away at it, he could only assume that they were digesting it for the arcia energy directly.

“I’m keeping this with me. Go hide now.”

“You got to return that to me; I want to make it into a ring for my wife!”

“Save that for when you survive.” Kyle sprinted off, the next group of mineral ants already coming in. As predicted, the mineral ants altered course and targeted Kyle again, leaving Feldon alone.

Shoving the crystalised arica into his pockets, he charged headfirst into the incoming squad, crushing them in a flurry of swings and kicks, using every part of his body to smash and pummel the mineral ant’s shell.

The moment he activated the pulverizer’s follow-up ability, he felt a warm sensation stemming from the crystalized arcia in his pocket, flowing into his body and rejuvenating his arcia energy internally. He could suddenly sense the vastly different flow of arcia within his veins and nerves: highly compressed and laminar, unlike his own internal arcia energy, which was sparse and had a relatively abysmal flow rate.

Suddenly, from the edge of his peripheral vision, he could sense a build-up of arcia energy – the flow in the air abruptly channelling into a large rock spider before an energy beam was fired right at him. The forewarning bought him time, allowing him to dodge with ease in advance. Kyle darted around the battlefield, killing rock spiders and mineral ants alike before coming to a surprising realisation.

I’ve never been able to sense arcia energy before. Kyle had always fought using his five senses, never once knowing what would happen when the enemy activated the engraving. Most of the time, the activation would only be marked by the glow of the engraving. Is this a result of the race upgrade or a side effect of the crystalised arcia?

He had no time to think, with three more energy beams blasting at Kyle. Kyle focused his attention on the ambient flow of arcia energy, but was only able to detect the channelling performed by the large rock spiders. Even when the smaller blue rock spiders fired energy beams at the mineral ants, he was unable to detect it as well. It seems my sense has a limit as well.

Just as he gutted out another rock spider with his pulverizer, a swopping black shadow accelerated towards him out of nowhere, slamming right into him and sending him rolling on the ground in a cloud of dust, coming to a stop against a pile of dead rock spiders.

Kyle’s eyes widened as he quickly shifted his head to avoid a stab from a black obsidian blade, which was followed up by a combo of slices and lunges from the new mineral ant variant, forcing Kyle to scamper on the floor to dodge. The variant stood on its hind legs, using four sharpened arms to target Kyle.

Kyle swung the pulverizer with his back to the floor, smacking the mineral ant variant right in the arms as it lifted it to block, having to use three arms in total while it slid on the floor, the friction between its feet and ground sending sparks flying.

Recovering into a fighting posture, Kyle hastily lifted his handle to parry another strike while backpedalling, unable to outmatch the four arms which were swinging wildly into a veritable murder machine.

Intimidation Aura!

An overpowering aura of fear suddenly emerged from Kyle’s body, staggering the mineral ant variant for a split second – but that was all Kyle needed. He immediately leapt forward, swinging the pulverizer right at the body of the mineral ant, the head impacting against the lower abdomen and causing it to crack apart like porcelain, killing the mineral ant immediately as it twitched to the floor.

Instead of moving on, Kyle quickly used his hands to feel for a groove in the dead warrior mineral ant’s body along the black obsidian blade arms, trying to find a weak spot. The moment he found it, he quickly slammed the pulverizer two times, breaking off the obsidian blade as the mushy fluids dripped from the open wound.

The sharpness of the black obsidian blade had astounded him, prompting him to try to use it as a weapon. However, the handle, which was the stump of the arm, was hardly rigid enough for him to deliver enough force through it. I need to find something sturdy to strap this to.

His mind returned to the previously dead large rock spider, deciding to try his luck there. While the sounds of skittering, corrosive acid hissing and energy beams sintering were all around him, he dug through the pile of corpses, trying to find something suitable.

Soon he found it – the leg of the large rock spider. With three hits of the pulverizer, Kyle broke off the straight part of the leg. He quickly stowed his warhammer behind his back, grabbing both ripped-off limbs and rushing to the nearest large rock spider who was still alive.

“HEY!” Kyle roared, catching the attention of the large rock spider, who swiftly turned to fire an energy beam at him. Instead of dodging, Kyle raised both limbs in his hand and used them to block, connecting them at the base. He stood there and took five energy beams coming right in, the heat searing and melting the impact zones.

Kyle quickly twisted off the stump of the arm, looking at his new creation while he now sprinted away. With the warrior mineral ant’s black obsidian blade serving as the tip and the large rock spider’s broken leg as the handle, Kyle now had a working sword of sorts, thanks to the high heat that had managed to fuse them in the middle.

I don’t need one. Kyle now had two weapons, allowing him to charge through the frenzy with abandon, slicing and smashing by alternating the weapons he used, wielding each of them in either hand.

The combination of the Intimidation Aura and the intermittent Penchant for Violence turned Kyle into a veritable battle machine, carving a path out for himself. The notifications for killing rolled in non-stop, earning him level after level.

Despite killing hundreds of ants, Kyle noticed his level was not proceeding as fast as it did in the Trial of the Horde. The EXP required per level is scaling upwards.

After ten minutes of continuous fighting, the mineral ants and rock spiders were beginning to avoid Kyle, treating him as though he was a natural disaster. Even the large rock spiders were skittering away from Kyle.

However, the venom-spitting hornets were unfazed, continuing to dominate the airspace while firing globs of acid with abandon, targeting every rock spider or human that was moving – which meant Kyle.

The acid was hard to deal with as Kyle was sure both of his current weapons would immediately melt from it, so he did not try to block. Instead, he lobbed the makeshift mineral blade as hard as he could towards the closest hornet, piercing it through while the weight of the blade caused it to crash to the floor in a squirming heap.

Covering the distance in five quick leaps, Kyle reached the fallen hornet, reaching out to grab the handle of the blade and pulling it out. With a follow-up slice, he decapitated the hornet’s head, with the body losing control of its acid gland, which leaked all over the ground, dissolving and forming a pit.

Kyle grabbed a few rock spikes and hurled them at the remaining hornets, killing a few of them while maiming many, forcing them to retreat. None of the mineral ants nor warrior mineral ants attempted to attack Kyle any longer, keeping a wide berth away from him.

Been a while since I got a title. Kyle wondered why he got a title for the mineral ants but not one for the rock spiders, thinking that it had something to do with the nature of the dungeon.

Capitalising on the fear both sides now had of him, Kyle headed for his prize: the crystal outcrop. If what was in his pocket was any indication, the entire crystal outcrop was a veritable treasure trove of arcia energy – potentially being the densest he had ever seen.

Kyle was not an expert on extracting arcia energy, but he estimated that the entire crystal outcrop could power the whole of Raktor for an entire week. Not even his regenerators back in the Culdao Peak could produce on such a scale for three months.

The question was if Kyle could make use of the arcia energy within to boost his own capabilities. As far as he could tell, every time he utilised an arctech engraving or skill, the crystalised arcia energy would then surge into his body, replenishing his storage.

As he scaled the crystal outcrop once again, with the makeshift mineral blade clenched tightly in his mouth and the warhammer behind his back, the mineral ants cleared a path for him while he made his way to the top.

He glanced at the exterior of the crystal outcrop on the way up, noticing that none of the formations on the sides was as clear or pristine as the one that Feldon had nabbed from the top. Instead, the crystals that he grabbed onto with his hands as he lifted himself were murky and tainted with some sort of impurities, making them look more like arcite ore rather than crystal.

Clambering up to the top, the flat top of the crystal outcrop was a veritable hive of mineral ants who were now feeding non-stop on the higher-quality crystals. Kyle went to town, immediately killing dozens of mineral ants in a whirlwind of devastation, the makeshift mineral blade drenched in mushy innards as he slashed non-stop.

With each step he took, and each swing of the pulverizer, the crystals beneath his feet on contact released their arcia energy towards him, creating a sort of training cycle which allowed him to continuously expend and expand his internal arcia energy without worry.

This is it! If I can train here, I’ll be able to improve Arcia Reinforcement to a higher level! Kyle smiled to himself. But before he could make another move, a large tendril from the ceiling suddenly accelerated towards him, wrapping around him in a constricting bind. Shit! It’s the tendril that Feldon was fighting! Penchant for Violence!

Kyle burst free of the tendril with a surge in strength, using his weapons to slice and wound the tendril. As he swung the makeshift mineral blade and sliced off yet another chunk of the tendril, the same wailing scream as before resounded through the cavern, nearly causing Kyle’s eardrums to bleed in response.

The impact of the soundwave knocked Kyle off his feet, with four new tendrils appearing out from beyond the gap, grabbing each limb and pulling him to their source, his body disappearing into the darkness.