BXBX NOVEL Chapter 218 Mountain Encounter
Chapter 218 Mountain Encounter
Arthur and Brambles gazed at the beautiful dusk that one didn\'t get to see all the time.
Especially for Arthur and other players, a scene like this was worth a lot. If they wanted to experience something like this in the real world, they would probably end up paying a few thousand UC.
This would either be in the form of transportation costs to get there, or taxes and transportation cost both if they lived within a city. After all, leaving a city to go to the rural areas wasn\'t exactly free.
One needed to pay a toll upon exist as well as entry.
And there was no telling just how far an area like this would be, as such the costs could vary. But at the very least, one would have to be ready to pay a couple of thousand UC to see something like this.
Perhaps only those that lived outside the city in the farmlands or more might see scenes like these. But the number of people that did that were limited as most of the farmlands now were either automated or had massive machine assisted farming that only needed a handful of humans to manage it all.
"Now this can be called heaven…" Arthur muttered as his gaze pierced through the horizon trying to look as far as he could.
Unknown to him, his pupils transformed into yellow dragon eyes again and glowed for a moment. The dusky orange horizon changed and a new scene appeared to him.
"Huh?" Arthur felt like he had seen something for a moment. "Weird. It\'s gone…" he muttered wondering if it was his imagination.
\'A curving silver line surrounded by sparkles… was I mistaken?\' Arthur wondered to himself.
"Ki kir?" Brambles looked at Arthur and chittered in inquiry.
"Nothing\'s wrong, I just thought I saw something." Arthur shook his head.
"Kiri? Kiri?" The beetle asked further.
"No it\'s not a flying ball of berries… what even is that?" Arthur looked at the beetle weirdly. \'What goes through his mind?\'
"Kiii-" Brambles seemed to be disappointed at Arthur\'s answer.
"Hmm… wait a minute. What do you see?" Arthur questioned next.
"Ki…. Kiriwu?" The beetle tilted its head, conveying its thoughts.
"Uhuh… So all you see is a orange layer with white blobs floating? And on the bottom its just a layer of green?" Arthur asked for confirmation.
"Ki!" The beetle nodded its head.
"Now I get it… your vision has a limited range of clarity." Arthur finally realized.
"Ki?" Brambles had no idea that the world he had been seen wasn\'t as limited as his senses told him.
Bering a beetle, Brambles had compound eyes, which made him have nearly 360 degree vision, but it didn\'t have a high detail and neither could he see too far.
Of course, after becoming the Dragon Horn Beetle, his senses including vision had improved, it still wasn\'t better than a human.
Though if one ignored his vision, the rest of his senses were rather good. Thus it didn\'t really disadvantage the beetle as it could slit respond and attack other foes if they were within its range.
In fact, his sense of smell was better than his vision and even his sense of pressure was good.
The beetle could feel faint vibrations in air that normal humans won\'t even perceive. Of course, this was limited to normal humans and not players or NPCs who had stats in the hundreds.
At that point, players would also become superhuman and be able to sense fine changes their human bodies would never feel without scientific equipment.
"It seems like we\'ll have to be a bit more clear on what and how we decide on targets." Arthur said to Brambles.
The beetle didn\'t fully understand his meaning, but knew that his master was talking about how to fight enemies. Fighting was something that came naturally to Brambles and his own instincts told him to fight as much as he could.
>The Mistress of Beasts is pleased at the player improving his understanding with the companion beast<
Much to Arthur\'s surprise a green notification popped up.
"Huh? Mistress you\'re here?" Arthur asked.
He waited for a minute, but received no reply.
\'Guess she just looked at me in the passing.\' Arthur reckoned.
While he knew that deities liked to watch players do things, how they actually found them was still a mystery. The deities had restriction and weren\'t really omniscient or omnipotent.
If they were either of those, there was no way they would need players to do their tasks and neither would they try to obtain more worshipers.
Plus them being either of those could be really troublesome for the players as it would be a great hindrance to them and their quest. Even if they were just omniscient, it would mean that the players won\'t be able to hide anything and would be observed at all times.
It would make a lot of the quests pointless as the answers would already be known by the deities.
Perhaps there really were some deities that were Omniscient, but they weren\'t ones that always interfered in the world or acted. In fact, there was a high chance that their omniscience also came at a cost and couldn\'t be used all the time.
"Let\'s see how far we can go Brambles." Arthur spoke. "I\'ll rely on you to sense the beasts now that its dark." He added.
"KIKI!" Brambles responded enthusiastically and flapped his wings to fly ahead.
The beetle took the lead, acting like a shield for Arthur in case anything ambushed them. Of course, if something attacked from the back, there was still a chance Arthur could get injured.
But he doubted something like that would happen here since Arthur already knew what kinds of beasts lived in this area.
~BAAAAAA~
And sure enough, a few minutes later a crude sound echoed across the valley.
"Brambles!" Arthur urged the beast.
"KI!" Brambles\' sense were alert and tried to sense where the enemy was.
His sense of smell was the first to react and picked up on the position of the beast.
"KIA!" Brambles informed Arthur through their link.
"South Eastern Cliff?" Arthur looked there but found nothing.
His passive night vision was working well, but he was still limited by his own range. Being able to see everything in the dark didn\'t mean Arthur also had telescopic vision.
"Kirika!" Brambles pointed to another cliff nearby.
"There?" Arthur looked at it, but found there to be no one there.
~BAA
The sound was heard again, this time a lot more clear.
\'This cry… which one out of those three is it?\' Arthur narrowed his eyes.
Arthur knew of a few beasts that made a cry like this, but didn\'t know which one could it be. He narrowed down the list to the beasts that were found in mountains like this and then tried to think of those that would inhabit this particular mountain.
But even then he came up with three beasts as the option.
~BAA~
"KIRI!" Brambles lifted his head and pointed with his horn.
"Up!?" Arthur looked in the sky and finally spotted the enemy.
His eyes shimmered and locked onto the enemy that was rapidly descending towards them. In the few moments that it was in the sky, Arthur managed to use his skill and obtained the information.
>Dragon\'s Insight has been successfully activated!<
~DING~
——
Target: Spring Hoof Goat
Rank: Uncommon
Level: 16
Type: Beast
Info: An extremely violent goat that has a great ability to jump. Its hooves are springy and allow it to jump to 10 meters in one go. It can further amplify its jumping ability using its mana.
***
HP: 100%
MP: 84%
Stamina: 89%
***
<Physical Stats>
Strength: 17
Toughness: 14
Agility: 20
Dexterity: 19
Vitality: 15
<Non-Physical Stats>
Wisdom: 3
Intelligence: 6
Will: 5
——
<Skills>
1. Great Hop
Info:? The user gathers mana in its hooves and releases it to jump to a great height. It allows the user to traverse a large tract of area as well as scale higher areas.
Cooldown: 30 seconds
Cost: 10% Mana for every use.
2. Jump Stomp
Info: The user jumps and stomps with using its falling momentum. The skill can cause crushing damage.
Comedown: 10 Seconds
Cost: 5% Mana for every use.
——
Looking at the info of the goat, Arthur knew that it was a bit weaker in some aspects than the frogs he had faced earlier. But the goat still had better agility and dexterity than them.
At the same time it had a movement type skill that could make it a tough enemy to counter if one was facing them for the first time.
"Ah, so its this one!" Arthur smiled. "Brambles guess what, this one will toss very well." He signaled.
"WAKIKI!" Brambles let out a chitter that felt like a shrill laugh, before charging towards the incoming Goat.
~THUD~
Just when the Spring Hoof Goat was about to land on Arthur, Bramble\'s horn appeared. It moved in the opposite direction and sent the goat flying back into the sky!