SSS-Rank Evolving Monster: From Pest to Cosmic Devourer-Chapter 75: Attack
Chapter 75: Attack
Ricky and Boar wandered across the scorched and unfamiliar lands of the Eldros Kingdom, the once-vibrant Thousand Emerald Forest now a distant, smoldering silhouette behind them. Black smoke curled high into the sky, staining the horizon as the wind whispered the cries of dying trees and charred spirits.
Ash clung to Boar’s wooden hide, and Ricky’s crystalline wings shimmered faintly with soot as they pushed forward into the unknown.
For hours, they moved in silence—one gliding through the air, the other galloping across cracked and flattened plains. The terrain had shifted drastically. The lush green canopy and tangled roots of the forest were replaced by rolling flatlands, barren and dry, stretching endlessly like a forgotten graveyard under the blood-tinged sky.
"I think we’re heading in the wrong direction..." Boar’s voice finally broke the stillness.
Ricky stopped mid-air, his wings coming to a gentle halt with a faint chime-like hum. He turned around slowly, his multifaceted eyes narrowing as he scanned the horizon. The ground below them was lifeless—dusty soil, scattered stones, and not a single sign of civilization in sight.
He said nothing at first, simply observing.
The geography was alien. Ricky had never left the forest before, not truly. The outside world was a mystery, and this empty land felt more like an illusion than reality.
He briefly considered retreating into the Inheritance Space. There, perhaps, the captured participants might hold valuable knowledge... or maybe even Noctyss could point him in the right direction.
Hmph... she’d definitely complain, though.
The thought lingered for only a moment before dissolving beneath a heavy sense of urgency that pressed harder with every heartbeat.
Today was the last day.
If he didn’t reach her now—didn’t save her before the sun set behind that blood-colored sky—then...
Ricky exhaled quietly through his mandibles, suppressing the weight building inside his chest.
On the ground below, Boar misunderstood Ricky’s silence, mistaking his gaze as a cue for explanation.
"Do you see—" Boar began, lifting a hoof to point toward the horizon.
But he stopped abruptly.
His entire posture stiffened. Wooden skin creaked as tension gripped his limbs.
Eyes wide and breath held, Boar stared past Ricky, his gaze locked on something behind him—something that hadn’t been there a second ago.
Ricky didn’t ask. He turned his head slightly, compound eyes reflecting a ripple in space.
The air a few dozen meters away shimmered unnaturally, as if reality itself had grown brittle. Then, with a soundless crack, the void fractured—like glass under immense pressure.
And from that fracture, five figures stepped into the world.
Clad entirely in black, they appeared without fanfare or light, like shadows peeling off the edge of reality. Their faces were blank, emotionless. Skin pale, movements calculated.
Leading them was a bald man, his eyes half-lidded with a lazy expression that was on the verge of boredom.
At first glance, he looked like a begger—someone with nothing better to do than loiter in ruins. But Ricky knew better.
Even without any movement, the pressure he exuded was sharp—sharp enough to cut through steel. An invisible edge of violence hung around him like a coiled blade waiting to strike.
A chill ran through Ricky’s veins.
He didn’t know who they were, but he could feel it in his gut—these weren’t mere scouts or travelers. Their arrival wasn’t coincidence. Their presence screamed intent.
These guys... they’re here for blood.
As Ricky stood there silently, a shift stirred within him. His spiritual space began to resonate.
The two darkness seeds in his body quivered, greedily drinking in the mana that now thickened unnaturally around the plains. Darkness flowed in currents through the ground, spiraling toward him like smoke toward a flame.
His body tensed, his instincts flaring.
Whatever this group wanted... it wouldn’t end peacefully.
Meanwhile, Boar stood motionless behind Ricky, his wooden muscles taut beneath his mossy fur. He didn’t dare speak. The oppressive weight in the air told him everything he needed to know.
These newcomers were monsters.
Even without exchanging a single blow, Boar instinctively understood that he wouldn’t last more than a second against them. His hooves had already begun to discolor, darkening until they matched the brown-gray hue of the dusty earth below—camouflaging, preparing.
If someone looked closely, they would have seen the trembling tension in his stance, the way his center of gravity shifted backward, ready to bolt the moment things turned bloody.
And they would. That much was certain.
Up ahead, the bald man holding a set of crystalline vials noticed Boar’s subtle change.
He grinned.
"Oh... my," he said, his voice mocking, theatrically clutching the bottles to his chest. "It seems I’ve upset the great Venom Fang Overlord’s loyal little pet."
He widened his eyes and staggered back half a step, pretending to quake in fear.
"Now the great Venom Fang is going to kill me! What shall I do? I’m so terrified..."
His exaggerated display was met with snickers from the others.
The four black-robed figures flanking him—high priests by the way they carried themselves—glanced at each other with amusement dancing in their eyes.
"Ahh, Vice Leader is too funny," one of them said with a low chuckle. "There’s never a dull moment with him around."
The group relaxed further, their earlier tension vanishing entirely. They had been camped outside the Thousand Emerald Green Forest for months, waiting. Their original orders were to flatten the place—but the Radiant Knight Order had beaten them to it, striking like divine thunder before they even moved.
Yet, despite all that effort, the target had slipped through the net.
So they waited in the shadows.
Waited until the mosquito revealed himself again.
And finally, here he was.
The one they called Venom Fang.
Despite knowing that Ricky had once slain ten Stage 2 cultivators in a single battle, none of the High Priests seemed the least bit alarmed. Their confidence brimmed, even as the wind grew heavy with tension.
But before they could fully appreciate their long-awaited prey, the air cracked like a thunderclap.
A silver blur shot forward, cutting through space itself with a whiplash of pressure.
The Vice Leader’s lazy smile vanished instantly.
His expression darkened as the attacker surged forward without a word—no warning, no hesitation, not even acknowledgment.
He ignored me... outright.
That calm, disdainful approach was more insulting than any insult could be.
Rage exploded in the bald man’s chest. The audacity.
"Die!" he roared, voice echoing like a bell toll from the underworld.
In an instant, a massive black spiritual field slammed downward.
Ten meters wide, dense and crushing, it spread like a heavy storm cloud across the barren plains. The earth groaned and cracked beneath the overwhelming pressure, spiderwebs of fractures racing outward from the Vice Leader’s feet.
Caught in its radius, Ricky’s silver glow clashed against the oppressive field.
His motion slowed—space itself warped, compacted—but he didn’t stop.
Even under the pressure of a Stage 2’s full might, he moved forward like an icy blade through molten lava, unyielding and unwavering.
There was no time for banter.
No time for warnings.
He needed to erase these clowns now.
Without even a glance toward the Vice Leader’s face, Ricky’s spiritual field surged outward—and condensed.
It took the shape of a blade.
A massive, radiant sword, more than five meters in length, coalesced in an instant. Pure silver energy shimmered off its edges, humming with sharp holiness.
The moment the blade appeared, the Vice Leader’s pupils contracted.
That technique—!
"Holy Sword?!" he blurted, eyes wide. "But... how...?!"
The technique belonged to the Radiant Knight Order. It was one of their core sacred arts, passed down through sanctified rites. How could a pest—a mosquito—wield it?
But he had no time to contemplate.
The sword was already upon him.
Teeth clenched in fury, the bald man made a hand sign and spat, "Formless!"
His body twisted and imploded into a cloud of black particles, dispersing in all directions like shattered ash.
The Holy Sword tore through the mist, undeterred.
A clean arc of radiant silver cut across the plains, leaving behind a line of scorched earth. Wind howled in its wake, carrying the scent of seared air.
But Ricky didn’t stop.
His frosty gaze never shifted.
Because that attack was never meant to kill the bald man.
It was a distraction.
Just as Boar vanished from behind him—his figure completely submerged into the earth—Ricky raised a claw and whispered, voice like frost on glass:
"Darkness Pulse."
Centered around Ricky, a shockwave detonated—silent at first, then roaring outward in a pulse of pitch-black mana. The very air trembled as darkness swallowed light, twisting the sky into a dull, oppressive shade.
The four High Priests barely had time to react.
Everything had happened too fast.
From the moment Ricky appeared like a silver phantom before them, to the strange vacuum that seemed to pull the breath from their lungs—their senses hadn’t caught up.
And then, it struck.
The Darkness Pulse erupted like a collapsing star, swallowing the world in a wave of force and shadow.
Caught completely off guard, the High Priests had no time to defend.
Their expressions twisted—shock, fear, confusion—all frozen in the instant before the wave consumed them.
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