Chapter 67: First Dungeon Clear
Since the Goblin riders used their skill charge, they were moving at high speed toward Alex, making them much closer; the heat flame scorched the wolf fur into cinders, exposing their bare, scorched skin beneath it.
Unable to handle the pain, the wolves rolled on the ground, causing the riders to fall; their makeshift armor heated up, scorching their skin with the heat.
But this was only the start.
Alex told Vesa to go all out, and that is exactly what Vesa did.
The fox kept growing in size, the flame grew even more intense, and the orange hue started flickering, changing into a whitish flame.
As the flame grows, the heat also keeps rising; if Alex is not the one casting it, he will already burned by the heat.
Emily, who saw what happened from a distance, can already feel the stinging heat on her skit despite using Qi to protect it.
The ground around Alex scorched all black.
Vesa then told Alex that the hammer had reached its limit; more than this, it would break.
Alex could feel the monstrous energy emanating from the firefox; he knew if he didn't release it now, it would blow up in his face instead.
BANG!
The fox launched with unnatural speed, targeting Zarnark. The ground it passed over was scorched black.
All of this happened in only a few moments, not allowing Zarnark any time to dodge.
They were too stupefied by the energy to react. By the time his mind caught up, it was already too late.
Meanwhile, Emily watched in a daze. With the amount of energy condensed, she could already predict the outcome.
She turned her gaze toward the area behind Zarnak; it wasn't just forest; part of the goblin settlement was there.
"Brother, you are so stupid!" she mumbled.
Adrenaline then rushed over her mind.
Without hesitation, Emily utilized her skill, boosting it with life force and turning her body into light.
If before she wouldn't care about their life and death, but now she couldn't get it out of her mind that they were just innocent bystanders.
Emily knew she would have nightmares if she didn't do anything.
Seeing the huge energy ball in front of them, Zarnak quickly gave out his order.
The goblin warriors and riders were already done for. He ordered the ogre to create a wall of flesh to block the attack.
Zarnak also spread his ability to the high goblins behind him.
With telepathy, the high goblins knew what to do; they jumped sideways, moving out from the impact area. As they did this, they poured their mana toward Zarnak.
A bangle in his hand started to glow; he poured all his mana into it, creating a mana barrier to block the attack.
Alex watched in surprise at the energy he had just unleashed.
It was the first time he had imbued life force into a secret technique, and the result was astonishing.
At this moment, his brain was busy calculating the impact of life force on the secret skill's damage, not yet realizing the aftermath of his attack.
Even though his ability, Cognitive Matrix, allows Alex to analyze every single piece of information, his brain still needs to process it and focus on the goal he wants to achieve.
At this moment, he is focused on combat, with his thoughts only on how to defeat Zarnark, so he ignores all data irrelevant to this.
Otherwise, his brain, even with progenitor blood, would get overwhelmed by the sheer number of data points existing.
If this were a normal situation, it would still be possible to manage since processing this data would take time, but Alex is currently in combat.
Even a single second could mean the difference between life and death.
Even though he can regenerate, with Emily watching, he doesn't want to traumatize her.
He can already imagine how Emily will react; she will probably go ballistic and then start getting overprotective, not allowing him to go anywhere alone.
The flickering orange fox then crashed into the barrier, creating a powerful shockwave.
It only lasted for two seconds before Zarnark could feel it wouldn't hold.
He decided to cancel it and recreate the barrier on his body since the target was him.
The fox should not explode until it breaks through the barrier.
SWOOSH!!!
The fox passed through the ogre like a knife cutting through butter. Zarnark then faced the fox head-on.
The moment they met, it wasn't even a contest.
Zarnark couldn't even hold his position; he got pushed through, turning into a streak of light, moving through the wall behind the arena, all the way to the goblin settlement, until it destroyed the outer wall and then some distance away.
"BOOOOM!!!!!"
The ground quaked, mushroom smoke billowed out, and a deafening noise spread through, making all the survivors put their hands over their ears to protect their eardrums.
A genderless voice then reverberated in the air, "Dungeon cleared,
checking the number of people that survive…,
calculating clear rank…,
Congratulations, you get an S Rank.
A portal will appear above the boss. Make sure to bring all your loot before leaving."
As the dust settled, what remained was just a huge trail of destruction left by the fox, stretching all the way into the forest.
The ogre now only had their legs left, with dozens of the goblin army burned to crisps on the ground. Alex didn't even need to hear the message to realize Zarnark was dead.
"Fuck!" he cursed.
With the burden of the fight lifted Alex started to register what had happened. He realized he had screwed up.
Just as he was about to start moving, a familiar voice reached his ears.
"No need to go; I've already made sure no one is hurt."
A particle of light started to gather in front of Alex, turning into Emily, her breath ragged.
Emily was exhausted; she had used much of her mana and qi to rescue those in the way of Alex's attack.