Re: Evolution Online-Novel

"This is new." Liam immediately took cover. His reaction speed was faster than the isons, so he erected a mana barrier before any of the disgusting dark green stuff could touch him.

However, the fact remained that these isons had launched a coordinated attack on him rather than his soul minions.

"Are you the one responsible for this?" Liam's gaze drifted back to the Queen's General, which was mixed in with the swarm. Since it made him a target, it was only fair that he did the same.

Without hesitation, Liam aimed for the Level 110 Queen's General and sent a surge of lightning towards the ison. 

Though fireball was still Liam's strongest attack, this was his fastest attack, and considering that the enemy was several levels above him, he wanted to test the difference in their reaction speed and fighting abilities.

In fact, Liam was counting on this to win the current battle. The isons had a clear advantage when it came to the rate at which they evolved, but merely gaining stats was not everything. 

One needed to be able to use it to their advantage and possess some skills that exploited these stats.

​ Liam also wanted to know just how many stats they gained per level and exactly how much disparity was between their strengths. He wanted to find out just how big the 20 levels gap between them was.

It was important to win this fight, but more than that, this was a chance for him to probe the enemy and find out more about these isons, particularly the stronger ones.

Liam zapped the multi-winged Queen's General that tilted its triangular caspase and looked at him. Since its location had been found out, it no longer bothered to remain inconspicuous by blending in with the other isons.

Liam couldn't tell what the reaction of the Queen's General was because the thing lacked a face or any kind of facial features except for the crystalline eyes embedded in the triangular head, but the way it reacted told him many things.

The ison did not seem to be too affected by the lightning bolt and quickly zoomed back away from the swarm.

At the same time, the rest of the swarm did not remain idle and continued raining down the toxic pus capsules on Liam. A portion of the swarm also zoomed down to attack him with their pincers ready to bite and mangle.

In the midst of the frozen wilderness, this scene looked as if a big black amoeba-like cloud was approaching Liam from all directions, aiming to engulf him completely. The sheer number of these insects looked dreadful.

Unfortunately for them, Liam was not alone. The soul minions on his side did not remain idle as they charged at the swarm of isons.

The wyverns, the six-winged lion, and the undead isons, including the undead Queen's Generals, all rushed up to meet the isons in the sky. Colorful magical attacks slaughtered the swarm before it could make any move.

Even though the isons seemed to have a clear order to target only Liam, it was impossible for them to do so with several huge draconic beasts watching his back.

Liam easily evaded the small ones and once again focused on the single ison that really mattered. 

However, as soon as he dashed into a clearing, several wind blades assaulted him one after the other. The Queen's General was already waiting for him as if it anticipated his move.

Liam instantly moved to evade the attacks, and for the ones that he couldn't, he used the black dragon sword to block. Each attack was heavy and powerful, sending ripples of strong, cutting winds, but it was still within his capacity to block them.

The Queen's General seemed to think otherwise. 

Its beady eyes were locked onto him as it continued to increase the attack speed and spun around in a weird fashion using the several wings on its back, sending out even more cutting wind blades, capable of decapitating anything in their path.

Liam continued to dodge the ison, and for a second, he seemed to be falling behind, having difficulty in blocking and parrying all of the attacks. One or two were about to hit him.

However, at the exact same time, something shot up and landed directly on the Queen's General. It was a cobweb spun by Helikatos. The strong mana-imbued threads bound the ison, and it was completely caught off guard.

Helikatos used this chance and shot out another few balls of cobwebs, all of them trapping the ison completely. It hurriedly used its blade-like limbs to cut out of the mess, but it was too late. 

The General, who was flying high so far, was already dropping down like a stone. To speed up things, Helikatos used one of the webs to latch onto the ison and forcibly pulled him down, thrashing the damn thing on the snowy ground.

The ison instantly tried to explode into a ball of acid and toxic pus to clear out the cobwebs, but it was already too late. As soon as the insect landed on the ground, Liam was already waiting for it with his [Fire Slash].

His sword brimmed with mana as he cut down the ison right at the center. Its strong metallic body groaned and screeched as it melted like butter under his assault.

The Queen's General screeched as it hurriedly called out all of the swarm to support it, but Liam was faster. He did not give the ison any more time as he landed three more consecutive slashes and completely cracked open the insect.

<Ding. You have gained 10000 experience points>

Liam grinned as he leaned down to pick up the shiny mana core lodged in the split-open triangular head of the ison. 

What he guessed wasn't wrong. Though the isons possessed the skill to evolve at a tremendous pace, they still did not have any special stat boosts and stat bonuses and only gained the basic stats per level. 

Compared to his stats at Level 91, the Queen's General stats at Level 110 was still lacking. The thing could not even put up a fight once it was subjected to a direct confrontation that was impossible to evade.

"So things are not out of hand just yet. Hmmm." Liam narrowed his eyes and observed the corpse when suddenly his face changed. He jolted up to stare at the distance, and it was unmistakable!

There were three more isons rushing in his direction, coming toward him at full speed, and all of them were very powerful enemies.