Chapter 20

They say that once a man is angry, he thinks uses a very small part of his brain. Well in this case Varz thought with zero part of his brain, all that filled his head was thoughts of blowing up the hellhound in front of him.

Falling through the ground, Varz couldn't help but regret his rash actions. If only he was a little bit more patient then maybe he would not be falling with his fate uncertain. He was filling grim at the moment. Would he die from falling from high heights or not. The fact he did not know made it seem like death was toying with him. He remembered what his mother told him in his past life before she died; " Fear what you know, but be terrified of what you don't know."

Just as thoughts of his most likely death was filling his head, Varz heard something that filled his body filled his body with relief.

'Water!' Looking down, Varz realized that he had fallen down into a deep cavern like structure with little streams or rivers flowing at different points. Plant life was abundant down here, with some of them being luminous, giving the cavern a mysterious but beautiful vibe.

"Amazing" Varz muttered, charmed by the beauty. 'How could something so beautiful be found in the wastelands of sakor' just as his thoughts were about to stray too far, the sounds of splashing water woke him up.

Parts of the cave walls that broke off during the explosion finally slammed into the pool, splashing water everywhere before disappearing without a trace.

'How deep is that thing' Varz pondered in his head, clearly shocked with the way it swallowed boulder like rocks without any trace remaining apart from the occasional ripples from smaller disturbances.

He didn't have to ponder on his depths because soon after he himself crashed into the lake, spiraling into the depths. Under the surface, small luminous plants glowed, lighting up the water bed with different colours. Small fishes swam away in haste because of the series of objects falling into their home. The scene would have been magical if not for the excruciating pain he was feeling at the moment. The thought of water being dangerous to him crossed his mind, but he later put it off because what kind of fantasy game would have water as the weakness of fire elementals. But as life would put it, this game was very realistic. The only difference now between Varz and a flame from a candle was that one could express his pain through actions, while one couldn't.

Writhing in pain, Varz swam towards shore. With every stroke he took, he felt like he was one step closer to passing out. His vision became blurry and his body became extremely cold. Just when he thought he wouldn't make it, his hand suddenly touched something apart from more water.

'Its land!' With hope so close to him, Varz pulled himself out of the water, plopping himself on the ground. This was the first time that he legit felt tired since he entered this world. Even when he jogged for days on end with Laha, he didn't feel as tired as he felt right now.

"Water is bad... very bad. That's good to know" Varz muttered while catching his breath. He may have almost lost his life today, but at least he now knew what was good and bad for his health.

In knowledge concerning his race, Varz was akin to a newly born child. Varz laid still until he finally felt like he would not die from any attack. Coming face to face with death so many times in a row was traumatizing to say the least. Not only did he have to watch out for overpowered creatures, he also had to watch out for unfavorable environment's.

After calming down, Varz stood up and started to inspect his surroundings. The more he studied the cavern, the more confused he felt.

'Why do I feel like this place was made to support life?' he thought in confusion, when he stepped onto something that gave out a crackling sound.

Raising his foot, he saw a bone the size of his wrist there. "What's this doing here" he muttered when he heard a sound that had been plaguing him since day one in this world.

It didn't take him long for him to realize what that sound was, for it has been the same sound that had been playing him from day one. Varz leaped backward, leaving space between him and his assailant. Not far from the spot he once stood was a hellhound baring it's teeth at him menacingly.

Staring at the hellhound, Varz couldn't help but shake his head in disdain "it seems like the bad blood between your kind and I is not going to end anytime soon." Varz said.

As if agreeing with his claim, the hellhound charged at him. Knowing that he was stronger than the mutt Infront of him, Varz wasn't going to run away this time. He may have regained his honour by killing the hellhound before, but deep in his heart, he won't feel satisfied until he had killed up to a hundred of these mutts.

Following the example of the hellhound he charged before yelling "That's it, show me what you've got!"

The two creatures, one on two legs and one on four met in the middle. The hellhound pounced towards his chest, intent on using its weight to make him fall, but Varz sidestepped. He had seen the muscles of the hellhounds legs tighten. Using that he managed to guess it's motive and move out of the way in time.

Seeing the hellhound fly by, Varz punched outward, smashing the side of its head with his flaming fist. The force from the punch sent it flying some distance, while disorienting it in the process.

Varz not allowing it to come to, pushed off the ground towards the downed hellhound. summoning a flaming spear, Varz stabbed downward to the mid section of the wolf, readily impaling it on the ground.

Since the spear was made of fire, no blood could be seen. Instead, the wound was cauterized, while the fire boiled the blood inside it's body.

*Awooooooo*

The hellhound let out a gut wrenching howl, stunning Varz into letting go of the spear.

"Shut the fuck up!" he cursed before stabbing it in the head with another flaming spear, silencing it forever.

The dead hellhound laid still on the ground with two flaming spears eating its remains. Although the fight ended quickly, this was still Varz first actual fight in this world. Varz plopped onto the ground feeling mentally tired. This was his first actual kill since he came to this world.

Although he had killed a hellhound above, that was because he had unknowingly taken advantage of the narrow space and a big ass fireball. Unlike that fight, this one had taken more mental strength, from predicting what it would do to feeling the sickening feeling of his weapon piercing into a live creature. All of this was very taxing to a very inexperienced varz

"It was either you or me, so I hope you can understand." Varz stated as he looked at the almost ablaze body of the hellhound a glimpse of pity in his eyes.

*Awooooooooo* *Awooooo*

Just as he was resting, a series of howls could be heard coming from every direction. Varz stood up in haste as he warily looked around, fear in his eyes. From where he stood, he could see figures on all fours running around in the distance. Even from where he was, he could tell that the amount was not anything to scoff at.

'It's the birth place of all hellhounds.' just at this moment, Varz heard Laha's voice in his head reminding him of where he stood. Removing his gaze from the Amanda of hellhounds coming his way, Varz looked at the small flame at his side, hate clear for all who could see.

It would seem that the hellhound wasn't howling in pain, but was instead calling for backup. "If I knew that you would give me this much trouble, I would have made your death more torturous than this" With regret pilling up in his heart, Varz readied himself for the biggest fight of his life.

It didn't take long before the first hellhound reached him. Varz created a flame spear, before hurling it at the hellhound. The spear flew through the air so fast that the hellhound only noticed something was flying towards it when it was too late. The spear went into the hellhounds head like a hot knife through butter, while the force from the throw carried it off into the distance.

Varz summoned two more spears before dashing towards the charging mass of bodies. The two parties met and all hell got loose. Varz stabbed the hellhound leading the charge in the head effectively killing it, while using his other hand to swat away another hellhound that lunged at him from the side.

He raised his left leg and stamped his foot hard on the head of the hellhound he swatted away before. Another hellhound lunged for his head, but was only met with a punch in return, sending it crashing into a group of five, slowing down the charge of dogs from hell.

Using the small space of time that he just bought himself, Varz launched his two spears into the tangled pack of hellhounds before summoning two more. He didn't even check to see if he had gotten a kill or not before clashing with another group of mutts.

The ground around Varz had slowly changed from grey to crimson red from the amount of dead bodies piled around, while the smell of cooked meat soon wafted through the air. Piles and piles of body soon started to form, but the mass of bodies still didn't seem to reduce.

Varz redirected a hellhound in the air into another hellhound causing them to tumble to the ground. He sent a brief glance around, and what he saw almost made him curse out in anger. Although he had killed a lot, there were still up to sixty to seventy more mutts to go through.

Now he knew why all those main characters in novels spat out boiling blood whenever they were in situations like this.

'This won't do, I have to find a way of killing them in batches?' Varz thought as he dodged an attack. Thinking back to the fight between Laha and the demon, Varz brain started to spin into overdrive. At this moment he remembered what the system description of his passive skill fire manipulation was.

'If i could control fire from my body, doesn't that mean that i could do the same with any source of fire around my body? Or doesn't it mean that I can make anything from fire away from my body as long as I have enough mana?'

While all these thoughts passed through, Varz was still besieged from all sides with fervour. He may have been a tier above them, but still an assault from all sides added more pressure to he who was still gaining combat experience.

Making up his mind, Varz yelled "Fuck it! if I am to die today, I will take all of you with me." Summoning all the mana he could muster, Varz released a small shockwave made of flames to push away anything close to him, before creating the biggest fireball he ever had before. The fireball grew so large that the gigantic cavern became as bright as day.

The lake released steam into the air from the surrounding heat, while all immediate plant life caught on fire. The ground slowly started to melt, with five meters around Varz already lava.

It was only when mana flow was cut off from the fireball did it finally stop growing.

Varz turned his gaze from the miniature sun of his creation to the mass of fleeing hellhounds. "You want to flee! Impossible." He launched the fireball towards them, before collapsing from exhaustion.

The fireball or miniature sun traveled with speeds that was inappropriate for its size, covering distances in seconds, while leaving destruction in its wake.

The last thing Varz saw was a bright white light before everything went blank.