Free Web NovelChapter 34: Beast Core
To burn the carcasses of the enemy was a power move that Jimmy did not expect from the crows. He was shocked.
This took guts, because not only was the war well declared to the enemy, but the burning of the carcasses also shattered every shard of potential diplomacy in the future. Peace treaties of any sorts were thrown out of the window.
"If the ravens corner any of us, they sure as hell won’t spare us now." Jimmy said to himself.
As the crows headed back to the city, Jimmy still chose to stay behind. Despite the risks of getting attacked, he circled back to the blazing fire, landed in front of it, and watched the deceased bodies of the enemies burn.
A lot had happened today. His wounds were barely holding themselves together, for one thing, despite the help he got from his sister. He had so many healing wounds on his body that one would think he would never heal at all.
The stench of blood that had coated his feathers so far to the point where he still remained red, was a constant reminder of what he went through today. He was feeling the effects of war one sniff at a time.
Likewise, he was a bit hesitant, and said to himself, "We lost twenty crows today, and the war isn’t even over yet. My fuck... that old bastard got us into two wars as well. We still have to try and kill that Fire Mage."
Jimmy was on his feet, he was alive, but with the problematics of the wars ahead of him, he found it hard to decompress. He stood in front of the fire, and sunk into a trance. He was trying to calculate a way where the crows stood victorious after the wars, without them being wiped out in the process. He hadn’t found a way yet.
"White Blade looked like he knew what he was doing, but he won’t be the only one fighting the war, will he?" He said, "It’s starting to look like I will be the one responsible for the war, and what the fuck will that get me? The crows are always looking for a reason to spit on me."
It was hard to be enthusiastic about the matter. He could only shake his head when he thought about how unfairly this life treated him.
"When did this get so complicated?" He sighed, "I was supposed to set these bastarding crows straight, not the other way around. Why am I suddenly an important crow that everyone hates at the same time?"
Finding the roots of all evil was difficult. He couldn’t blame his problems on a single crow, as that wouldn’t make sense. There were plenty of crows to blame, including himself, but regardless, he stopped thinking about the matter eventually.
When he snapped out of the trance, the fire had died down. The carcasses of the enemy had been reduced to ash. Their stench spread across the atmosphere until it was no longer noticeable.
Jimmy was ready to fly back to the city now, but as he took off, he noticed something shiny within the ashes.
Curious, he flew towards it, landed near the ashes, and clawed the shiny object towards himself.
It was a gem of some sorts. Less than an inch long, and silver in color.
There was this great symmetry to it that he couldn’t understand. It looked expensive.
Jimmy stepped on it, so as to grab it with his claws, but at that moment, the gem shattered.
"What the fuck?" He grunted, "The fire didn’t crack it, but my foot did? I’m not that fat."
Considering that it shattered, he even expected it to cut his foot, but he didn’t feel any pain. He even thought that he was immune to pain, considering what he went through, but as he analyzed the matter further, he found that not only had the gem not cut his foot, but it, along with its shards, had fully disappeared!
"What?" He tilted his head.
A second later, he spotted a tiny string of silver light rising from where the gem used to be.
The string of light rose upwards, and then it dissipated into his chest feathers as if it tried to stick on them.
[Beast Core absorbed. Task 10 complete.
Reward: 200 system points]
[Total points: 10,567]
[Retractable Razor Armor evolution: Level 1 >>> Level 2]
"Oh..." He pulled his head back in shock, "So that’s what a Beast Core is? I can keep stealing their shit even after I killed them?"
[Essentially, yes.]
[Beast Cores, be it from any creature great or small who has some sort of skill or evolution to protect, is concentrated in their Beast Core. If you learn how to look for the right cores, your progress can accelerate significantly.]
"Hmm... got it." He nodded.
Afterwards, he waited for the ashes to cool down for a little bit, and one after the other, he retrieved eleven more Beast Cores.
The cores belonged to the deceased Razor Squirrels. He knew that much.
Jimmy also looked for cores that could’ve come from the ravens, but either they didn’t survive the fire, or the ravens hadn’t gathered enough skills or evolutions to stash behind a Beast Core. He wasn’t sure, but he stopped looking for them at some point.
The eleven other silver Beast Cores helped him significantly! Although not all of them gave him an entire level’s worth of an upgrade, their help was still significant. It was painless too, and very instant! He didn’t suffer through the evolutions as he usually did in other cases.
At last, as he absorbed the last core, the system notification that came afterwards felt like a satisfying reward.
[Retractable Razor Armor evolution: Level 6 >>> Level 7]
Jimmy smiled, and then summoned the armor with barely any effort.
A layer of silver spikes spread across his body, from head to tail.
"Nice!" He celebrated.
The spikes, or otherwise called razors, had grown a whole inch in size, totalling an average of two inches. This may not seem like much, but the spikes were sharper, pointier, and would make it far more difficult for some creatures to hurt him in close combat.
Even sideways attacks from a blade might struggle against his armor from here on out!
Better yet, this evolution hadn’t even reached its full potential yet. It could be upgraded two more times, up to level nine!
"Well shit... at least I got something decent out of that damned fight." He smiled, "I was being eaten alive, for fuck’s sake."
