Exploration, Arrival

After a good night's rest, the exploration of the spacial realm continued as the three continued to advance towards the center.

On their way, they found various isolated monsters that they fought, gaining valuable experience for their monsters as well as combat experience.

After seeing the same scenery for miles and miles, they finally saw something different. A giant pit leading deep into the ground, surrounded by lush vegetation. Water from surrounding pools trickled steadily into it, and a repulsive smell wafted from inside.

"There should be a group of monsters staying inside that are producing the smell," Aura said.

The group approached the pit, covering their noses. Their shoes sank into the thick, viscous mud, forcing them to move slowly. Over the squelching sound of their feet, they heard the sound of splashing and fluttering wings from inside.

A strangely shaped shadow entered their field of view, unsteadily wobbling in the air.

[Screeching Batfish - Wild]

Type: Water

Level: 9

Health: 32/32 (Healthy)

Constitution: 9

Strength: 6

Agility: 15

Defense: 13

Mana: 62/62

[Skills]

Soul Screech - Screeching Batfish screeches, shocking the target's soul and dealing damage

Water Wings - Screeching Batfish can travel through water and the air, and can absorb mana through its wings

Aura saw the skills of the Screeching Batfish and felt it was quite troublesome. Soul attacks were difficult to defend against, and by absorbing mana through its wings and staying in the air, it could whittle down the enemy through a battle of attrition.

"We should attack it all out, don't bother defending. It will be bad if its friends arrive before we finish it off."

By now, Aura and Lydian had developed a tacit understanding of each other and they attacked the Screeching Batfish in sync. The strange fish, seeing enemies charging at it, flapped its wings, thinking of evading in the air. There wasn't much room for maneuvering in the channel leading underground however, and Puppet wrapped it up and dragged it down. The Screeching Batfish released a shrill scream, but Lyn, ignoring the pain, continuously attacked it.

Puppet and Lyn surrounded the fish and interrupted its struggles to return to the air. They ignored its continuous Soul Screeches and steadily lowered its health until it fell to the ground.

By this time, the sounds of fighting had alerted some of the Screeching Batfish further inside. Three more fish flew at the two contracted monsters who had yet to recover from the fight and started to repeatedly bombard them with Soul Screeches.

"We can't let this continue, focus on the one flying the lowest and use a soul technique to boost all our monster's skills!" Aura ordered.

Countless Puppet Strings spewed out of Puppet and the summoned Puppet Sprout as the light surrounding Lyn became even brighter. Lyn stampeded into the immobilized Batfish and slammed it with a boosted Shatter. A massive amount of damage was dealt to the fish in an instant, and the continuous damage coming from the Puppet Strings claimed the Screeching Batfish's life.

With one dealt with, the pressure on Puppet and Lyn was greatly reduced. They finally finished the battle when Aura and Lydian's mana was almost completely empty.

After a long rest, they ventured further inside, but only encountering one or two Screeching Batfish at a time. They eventually reached the bottom of the giant tunnel. Before their eyes was a large spirit jade deposit, covered in the white slimy feces of the many Batfish that had lived there.

"So this is where the smell was coming from," Ariel said. "It smells even worse up close."

"Well, let's start scraping it off. We were almost running out of spirit jade and we happened to run into this at the perfect time." Aura pulled up his sleeves and started cleaning and packing up the spirit jade. By the time the group was done, a few large boxes were filled up.

"There was a lot more than it lookrd, this can last us for a while," Lydian said happily.

They carried everything out and left the pit. Puppet pointed out a direction, and the three continued following it. After a long period of time, Puppet gestured at the group.

"Puppet says we're about to arrive at the center."

Before long, they saw a large area shrouded in mist. They approached it, and what they saw inside made their jaws drop.

"Is that... is that a tree?" asked Lydian.

In front of them was a massive tree the size of a skyscraper. Countless wild monsters wandered around it, and flying monsters nested in the branches. The tree seemed to reach the sky, and the massive expanse of leaves cast a shadow that covered the land around it.