Hidden Worm (2)

As soon as my sword touched the core, I felt the corrupted energy fighting against the pure energy of the potion on my sword. It was so strong that my hands began to shake, but I held firm and continued to push deeper into the core.

Destroying a mana core is basically the death of a monster, a human could survive without its core, although the human would suffer from it, but a monster can not, they need to manipulate mana to survive.

That's why we went straight to the core, our plan was to use the water so that we could navigate inside the worm's inside and find its core, which usually would be hidden, but because the monster is using mana to be able to breathe, the core is exposed.

A fatal weakness, a perfect plan, that's what Eliza said. But things can never be that easy, before my sword could completely destroy the Hidden Worm, I felt a strong force pull us away together with all the water around us.

We were swept away from the core along with the flood, and in just a few seconds, we found ourselves outside of the monster. It had vomited us up along with all the water in its system.

I'm totally soaked and stinking of vomit. Looking up I saw the Hidden Worm, alive, and I knew that we fucked up, destroying the core was our main plan, and we failed. I failed.

Out of the monster I noticed something, that we were not in the underground, we were on the surface. I looked around and saw Aaron and Eliza a few meters away from me, both of them also a little dazed.

Eliza got up and cleaned herself a bit, and approached me, Aaron did the same, both watched intently at the monster, who was still recovering itself.

"You guys found the core?" She asked.

"Yes" I answered, "But we didn't managed to completely destroy, but I did pierced it with my sword"

"You used the purification potion?"

You think I'm stupid? "Of course"

She became quiet all of sudden, and I noticed that she was thinking about something.

So I asked, "What's the plan?"

She frowned at me, "The plan was to destroy the core, but you didn't, so we're basically at a standstill"

I refuse to believe you don't have another plan.

I didn't needed to say that, because Aaron said it for me, "You have another plan, tell us"

"I really don't have" Then she glanced over at the Hidden Worm and analyzed for a second, "But I guess you guys didn't failed completely"

I looked over to the monster, and noticed that it was still recovering, which is something abnormal, because a grade 5 would recover easily from the exhaustion, and I didn't even completely pierced the core.

But then Eliza said, "You probably dealt enough damage to the core to the point where the monster can't use mana at all"

That makes sense, that thing can probably still use mana, if it couldn't he wouldn't even be alive, but it was probably greatly reduced.

"The most powerful advantage that this thing had was the underground, but I bet it can't use its abilities to pierce the ground and return," Eliza added.

Then Aaron finished, "Are you telling us that we should kill a grade 5, by ourselves?"

"That was the plan since the beginning"

"We had a plan before," Aaron retorted.

"I'll create one, just give me a few seconds"

Unfortunately, we didn't have that time, the monster started to move, we saw it try spinning its teeth and devouring the ground, and though he succeeded, it was slow, very slow. Enough for me and Aaron to catch up to it.

Before that thing could escape, I ran to the monster and touched it, marking the beast, then I jumped into the air and saw Aaron preparing his strike with his weapon, an immense hammer.

Then I saw Aaorn jumping towards me and I said, "Exchange"

Saying that I switched myself with the Hidden Worm who appeared in the sky, and was immediately struck by Aaron using his innate magic, the blow was so strong that the worm was launched back to the ground, causing a cratera.

But Aaron hasn't finished yet, he landed on the monster and continued to launch many attacks towards it. But the Hidden Worm counterattacked, and shot one of its teeth towards Aaron.

Watching the scene I said, "Exchange"

And Aaron switched with a stone that I randomly found just a few seconds ago, appearing on my side he nodded.

Then we watched as slowly the Hidden Worm recovered, but instead of trying to escape, it looked at us and released more of its disgusting mana.

"It seems like we irritated the beast," I said.

And Aaron asked to Eliza, "What's the fucking plan?"

 "Distract that thing for a minute or two, I'm still thinking"

A minute or two, my innate magic is still working, even though I switched Aaron with an object and even switched myself with something as big as the Hidden Worm, I can keep going.

My thoughts were interrupted when I sensed something coming towards me. Instinctively, I switched places with the rock I had used earlier. I could only watch as one of the beast's teeth pierced Aaron's hammer and reached for his chest.

I thought I was going to land on top of the monster, but I didn't notice that the rock had fallen on the ground. As soon as I switched to the rock, the Hidden Worm was already behind me with its wide mouth open.

Without options, I jumped straight into its mouth. Before it could close again, I ripped out one of its teeth, marked it, and threw it outside. Then, I switched places with it and ran away with everything I could.

Getting distant from the monster, I allowed myself to look for Eliza and Aaron, and I found them. Aaron was on the ground, and Eliza was using one of the healing potions on him.

The potion is exceptional, but Aaron will be out for a while, which means I'll have to deal with this monster alone until Eliza is ready.

I lost my sword, and I have nothing to switch right now on me, this will be difficult.

Then I heard someone shouting my name, "Iske!"

It was Eliza. I turned to glance at her and saw that she had thrown something to me. I caught it in the air. It was a blade, one that she always carried with her. It wasn't as big as a sword, but also not short enough to be a dagger.

I gladly accepted it and drew it preparing myself to fight against the Hidden Worm.

Then I heard her voice once more, "Just hold for a few minutes!"

I didn't answer and released my mana at 50% of my output. I couldn't use 100%—not now, it's too early. I'll use it if I need it, but for now, 50% is enough. With my mana released, the monster became hyper-focused on me.

And all of sudden, the beast's speed increased and it came towards me, I prepared myself and also began to move, running away from the monster while I grabbed as many rocks as I could on the ground.

After that I sensed the beast shooting more of its teeth towards me, so I launched a rock to my side and switched, escaping from the monster's attack. Then I gently threw a rock on the ground a few meters on my right side, and then started running away again.

But once I saw the monster pass by the rock, I prepared my blade and switched places with the rock I had left there. Appearing on the side of the monster, I pierced it while running, causing a deep and large wound.

Then the monster tried attacking me with its body, and I switched myself back with the stone.

I saw the monster confused not knowing what happened, and that almost made me laugh.

My innate magic is not that powerful, but it's hard to deal with, and has a lot of functions, it can be used to defend and attack. It's an extremely irritating ability.

While looking at the monster, I saw once again the injury I just caused, it must have caused a lot of damage to the monster. That thing is certainly weak, I just used mana reinforcement and I managed to cut through it.

The core must be very damaged, in normal conditions, I would be only able to damage the Hidden Worm using a technique.

When I thought the advantage was mine, the Hidden Worm did something unexpected, it ran away piercing the ground like a drill. In the same moment I ran towards the monster while saying:

"Exchange"

I switched with it and appeared in the hole the worm created. Without wasting time I jumped back to the surface, reaching the ground, I saw the Hidden Worm waiting for me.

Without hesitation that thing used its body to hit me, I only managed to block and I was sent flying away.

I couldn't do anything as I felt my consciousness fade away.