Meanwhile, the frog began falling, and seeing that John and the other monsters had disappeared, it became confused and lost its target of attack.
But if John and others were still there, the frog would have unleashed a giga-freezing orb that would have blasted and frozen everyone. Fortunately, John escaped in time.
After the frog landed on the ground, it looked up and saw Pymon.
’Master!’ Pymon flew around, nervous but also ready. He decided to act bravely as John said and shot at the frog, Tempest Streak activated.
The frog croaked and opened its mouth, shooting a meter-long icy bullet at Pymon, breaking the sound barrier as blasts rang.
Pymon tried to dodge and even dodged two bullets barely while unleashing Lightning Whip each time, whipping the frog and damaging it, but failing to paralyze it.
Alas, the third icy bullet hit Pymon and bore a hole into its right wing before it began freezing fast.
However, John returned again with a new gang while recovering his and Alfred’s soul energy by consuming Silver Essence Coins’ energy.
"Alright, fatty. It’s time to die!"
’Alfred, full-powered Shader Blaze Beam and then Shader Zero at its limbs. Try to control the freeze spread.’
"Awooo!"
Vorpal Howl’s effect was still running, and this sudden Shader Blaze Beam burst with Shader Zero froze the limbs of the frog tightly.
Croak!
The freezing was about to crack, but the frog wasn’t given any more time as the bombardment of various skills from Monsters that John brought struck the monster and more bullets right into its eyes, which rattled its brain.
In the end, the frog died without doing anything anymore.
"I’ll extract it later. First, let’s see if this fatty was hiding anything in the pond," John rubbed his palm as he sent all monsters except for Pymon inside Monster Paradise.
The extraction of Gold-rank Monsters was a bit different.
Bronze-rank Monsters had Soul Core.
Silver-rank Monsters had Soul Crystal, an upgraded form of Soul Core.
Gold-rank Monsters had Soul Pond, a pure liquified reserve of Soul energy.
So, extraction would depend on how much of that Soul Pond a Tamer could extract and condense into a Soul Orb.
"Tsk, nothing’s inside." John felt disappointed as he found nothing in the pond.
"Well, let’s extract this fatty, and then exit from that new passage above," John said as he looked at the crudely sealed passage. "Pymon, come here and eat the leaf to heal. Afterward, destroy that passage."
"Kreee!"
Pymon ate the leaf and recovered from the wounds before flying up towards the crudely sealed passage.
Meanwhile, John pointed his palm at the frog, beginning the extraction.
It took him one minute to complete the extraction of a thumb-sized orb.
But it was still more potent and had more energy than Silver-rank Monsters’ soul crystals.
John could use it to recover his or his Pet monster’s soul energy in an emergency, since absorbing it for progression was not an option yet.
"Alright, let’s check out the passage."
John jumped on Pymon and rode towards the passage.
It was short, and the surface was just ten meters away.
However, John suddenly heard some sounds and stopped.
Pymon, grabbing the passage’s soil with its claw, rotated his head to look at John, confused.
’Get inside.’
John sent Pymon into Monster Paradise and crawled up before hitting the ground above. He dug it slowly and then peeked out.
’Huh?’
About fifty meters away was a camp and giant Gold-rank Monsters sitting outside as if guarding. The smoke was coming out of a campfire in the middle as people were talking.
’It looks like I encountered other Tamers. What should I do now?’
John blinked.
’Whatever I do, first I need to get information about them while staying hidden. But before that...’
John vanished, entering Monster Paradise.
Everyone was tired, including him, so first, he decided it was time to rest.
If those Tamers were still there after he woke, he would scout them using some monster’s skills first.
Putting himself in danger was not an option. He couldn’t trust random people who were more powerful than him. That was like entering a crocodile’s mouth and hoping it won’t snap.
...
John woke up after five hours.
He wasn’t in a hurry. The first thing he did was finish his daily training in Monster Geno Art.
Seeing the slow progression, John pulled his face. ’Fuck, I need resources.’
If he wasted time just training without resources, he wouldn’t be able to train his pets to their full potential.
Azelis was right in that it would be difficult to catch up to those powerful Silver-rank Tamers in just five days, but John wanted to make it possible.
’Fuck it.’ John grabbed the Metal-attributed silver-rank resources and trained for a couple of hours to get some solid progression.
Alfred had already reached level 2 in Blood elemental mastery, so John used Alfred’s blood energy instead of Blood-attributed resources.
He would save the Blood-attributed resources for Rexion.
A couple hours in, John absorbed the resource, and stll continued a bit to get the round figure in his stats.
As John was close to ending the session, he suddenly felt something strange.
’This...’
Opening his eyes, John felt as if his senses were enhanced slightly, and he could smell something from afar.
’Wait, that’s blood!’
John blinked.
’Fuck.’
He finally reached Blood Mastery level 1!
Standing up, he used Strider’s Gaunt. Blood flowed in his body faster, empowering him further!
Swoosh!
His stats had also increased with the session of training Monster Geno Art, and with Blood Mastery level 1, he became even more agile and faster when using Stider’s Gaunt!
[John Wicked]
-Soul Rank: Silver
-Soul Talent: [ Lifebloom Enchantment ]
-Stats:
— Strength: 60
— Defense: 59
— Speed: 60
— Soul Crystal: 500/500
-Pet Monster Space: [3/3]
-Skills:
—> Inspect.
—> Evolution Pathways.
—> Genetic Pocket.
—> Monster Paradise
-Soul Techniques:
—> Blood Alloy Sculpting
-Monster Geno Art:
—> Bloodlash Veinforge Strider.
’Alright, time to head out.’
John exited and appeared right in the passage at his previous position. After peeking out his head, he saw the camp was still there.
’Man, I wish I had a scout-type soul technique or Geno ability right now.’
Dropping down again, John vanished and entered Monster Paradise.
He arrived beside Alfred and said, "Buddy, there’s a mission."
"What do I have to do?" Alfred asked, tilting his head slightly.
"First, I want to try something. We have a soul connection, and this is the world of magic. There should be a way for me to see everything that your eyes can see."
John closed his eyes as he spoke and connected with Alfred in the soul network.
"Let’s try to share our senses."
"Okie."
John and Alfred tried for a bit when John suddenly felt a jolt in his senses when overlapping his conciousness avatar with Alfred’s.
’This...should work. Hmm, so it will be like me sitting in your head. I won’t be able to move my real body, but I can see and hear everything through you.’
’Yes, that seems to be the case, John. So what do I have to do now?’
’There’s a camp out there with five Prime-stage Gold-rank Monsters guarding it. I am going to send you out, so use Umbral Drift and take a hiding position somewhere suitable to observe the camp.’
’Got it.’
’I wonder if they got some juicy resources or some other important stuff.’