Chương 391: 362: Change of Plans — We’re Going for Points Now

Thalion ended his Mistform right before the palace. It looked like he was the first one to enter this building. Enough time had been spent on the sidelines. He could perfect his movement skills in real combat now and he wanted to test his curse a bit more. As for the treasures... he hadn't fully decided yet. He still wanted to keep a low profile so most wouldn't see him as a threat, but maybe he could reach the top rankings even without killing a chosen.

When he had first entered this treasure hunt, he'd assumed that a high number was the greatest advantage. But this event was different—the treasures weren't simply lying around. In the last stage, most points came from hunting beasts, something large groups didn't necessarily help with. If this trend continued, he could realistically aim for the leaderboard. Either way, Thalion wanted to test his abilities and conduct a few experiments. The palace seemed abandoned, the doors hanging wide open.

The entire structure reminded Thalion of a forgotten cathedral, with its colorful glass windows and towering spires. Aside from one distinct life force inside, he couldn't sense anything else. The blood within that being was immense—far too much for any ordinary creature. It had to be a beast. The only exception would be a blood mage. Thalion landed before the gate and flung it open, ready for combat.

Once again, there was that familiar distortion of system magic—the inside space was far larger than the outside suggested. What stood before him was an eight-meter-tall minotaur. The creature waited in what looked like a grand ballroom, everything made of gold. Numerous tables were covered with expensive curtains and cloths. But what caught Thalion's attention most was the portal at the far end of the room. It was only slightly taller than an average person—definitely too small for the minotaur to fit through.

The creature must have been guarding it. Thalion barely managed to use Identify before the bull-headed giant roared and charged at him, trampling every piece of furniture in its path. Minotaur, Level 115 High level and high rarity—that much was certain. Judging by the way it moved, the beast hadn't taken a single step before Thalion opened the door. He immediately activated one of his strongest skills, Phalanx of the Blooded Templar.

This time, he didn't form the portal above or beneath the rampaging monster, but slightly above and behind himself. Partly because the creature's speed meant most of the lances would miss anyway, and partly because he simply wanted to test if it was possible. The minotaur didn't seem to notice, or didn't care about the massive power gathering behind Thalion. He decided to pour even more energy into the spell. The portal began to hum violently with raw power, and over eight-meter-long crimson lances erupted outward.

The force of the attack was so immense that several of the blood spears tore straight through the beast's thick hide, launching the multi-ton creature several meters back. It was far more destructive than Thalion had intended. This was an exceptionally powerful beast, and he'd wanted to see how his curse affected such a being. The minotaur barely survived the barrage but found itself writhing on the ground as the curse spread through its veins.

Thalion could have used his blood manipulation to drive the lances deeper or twist them inside the wounds, but he refrained. The creature seemed to have some degree of resistance and it took over twenty minutes before the curse finally took hold. When it did, the lances were absorbed into the minotaur's body, its eyes igniting with a crimson glow as its wounds began to heal rapidly. Now came the interesting part. Would the minotaur obey his command?

"Protect the portal," Thalion ordered, his voice calm and precise.

"Kill anyone who dares to enter this place." The creature began pacing from side to side, as if it couldn't wait for another intruder to arrive. Thalion took that as a yes and walked past it without hesitation. His title didn't give him any sense of danger, so it should be safe. Now, to the portal. It probably led to the true treasury, but it could just as easily be a trap. He decided to loot the ballroom first. The golden furniture that had survived the rampage would surely yield a hefty number of points.

Thalion flashed between tables and chairs with Telekinetic Dash, not missing the opportunity to train his movement skill. He was right—the furniture granted a surprising amount of leaderboard points. His guess was that, in most cases, these items were destroyed during the fight before anyone managed to bring down the guardian. An interesting mechanic, for sure. Good thing he hadn't tested any of his less controlled skills in here.

It actually took longer than expected to clean out the entire hall, but when he finished, Thalion stood at 1, 105 leaderboard points. This also confirmed Thalion's theory that each stage grew in importance, and that the earlier ones really didn't matter much. The top contenders were sitting around four thousand points, but that didn't mean Thalion couldn't catch up. If he clashed with one of the chosen later in the event, he'd simply try his luck.

Since he couldn't detect any hint of the portal being a trap, Thalion took the risk and stepped straight through it—only to appear before a horde of monsters. It was a hidden cavern with stone walls, likely buried deep within the mountain beneath the palace. The enormous cave was teeming with creatures that looked like giant rats. Their entire frames were oddly cube-shaped, and they were so muscular they could have won any bodybuilding contest.

Some even seemed freshly shaved for their "final performance," which looked downright ridiculous in Thalion's eyes. Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site. They were all E-grade—so no reason to waste time. The rats reacted fast, but Thalion was faster. A crimson jungle began sprouting around him, the Sanguis Impera finally unleashing the hunger it had suppressed for too long. Thalion wasn't content with merely cursing the rats this time.

Vines erupted, impaling the rodents while red flowers released a thick mist. The moment the rats inhaled it, new vines sprouted from within their bodies. On top of that, they had to fight against the curse—even as Thalion and the Sanguis Impera drained them dry long before it could take hold. The pain from the curse made it easier for the Sanguis Impera to grow through their bodies and connect them to the jungle. Within seconds, their forms withered into empty husks.

The rats knew no fear and just kept coming, a relentless tide like undead swarming prey. Some managed to gnaw through a few vines, but the moment they touched the ones faintly burning with dark red fire, they were afflicted by the curse again. That gave the vines enough time to regrow and impale them anew. Thalion didn't just watch the carnage—he decided to experiment. He wanted to see if he could retract the aura of his divine passive skill.

Normally, it was excellent for spreading the curse, but there were times he wanted to move undetected. As things stood, someone could just light a torch on a watchtower and immediately spot his presence. Even his other forms didn't help, since they all carried the same passive skill. The problem was: he had no control over it. Unlike blood, it had no edge he could push or pull back—it was simply there. Meanwhile, hundreds of rats died within minutes, which didn't exactly make it easier to concentrate.

Still, he didn't want to stand idle and waste time. The rats earned him another four hundred leaderboard points—not bad at all. If it continued like this across the stages, he might genuinely have a shot at placing high enough without ever fighting a chosen. Thalion followed a tunnel on the opposite side, leading him into another cavern filled with rats. They looked mostly the same—except many now wore crude metal armor with spikes, and a few in the back even wielded longbows.

Admittedly, they looked kind of cute doing so, Thalion had to admit. He repeated the same procedure but offered the Sanguis Impera some assistance this time. Against armored rats, it would take too long otherwise. There were also several new things Thalion wanted to test. One of them was the explosive enchantment on his armor and sword, which hardened his blood to the point where it detonated upon impact. Thalion formed ten blood thorns aimed at the archers in the back, then activated the runes on his armor.

He instantly felt the difference—the surge of power coursing through him and poured more and more strength into the thorns before letting them fly. Ten explosions shook the cavern a second later. When the dust settled, there wasn't a single archer left. Only a slow-falling red mist drifted down like snowflakes. The fact that those tiny crimson flakes—normally harmless—still carried traces of the curse and infected nearby rats was astonishing. All in all, Thalion was very pleased with the test results.

In fact, it couldn't have gone better. Unfortunately, the remaining rats perished before he could test the same feature with his sword, as the Sanguis Impera consumed them all. After spending a few minutes storing the armor in his amulet, Thalion continued deeper into the tunnels. The next cavern contained even more armored rats, but this time, the sword test didn't go as smoothly as the one with the blood thorns. His crimson slash cleaved several rats in half before detonating.

Not bad—it could withstand more energy—but it also risked backfiring if it failed to explode. Still, Thalion was satisfied with how things turned out. The next chamber, however, was his first true challenge. It was completely different from the others—still full of rats, but this time most of them walked upright on their hind legs, armed and armored. They had even built a wall and a small fortress within the enormous cavern.

Towers lined the structure, filled with archers and mages—or at least that's what Thalion assumed, judging by the glowing staves they carried. Thalion quickly realized that all of the rats' weapons and arrows were enchanted with lightning. Normally, he would have switched to Eagly, especially given how enormous this chamber was, but the Sanguis Impera had been on a diet for far too long, and it was finally time to feed the plant what it deserved.

Thalion decided to use the opportunity to test a few more of his abilities. He darted around the battlefield with a combination of his movement skills and blood control while a crimson jungle blossomed beneath him. He unleashed his flamethrower skill at full strength, which now resembled the breath of a dark red dragon. The air itself howled around the torrent of fire, and every rat caught in its path was incinerated instantly.

Several times, Thalion had to activate his mana barrier to deflect incoming arrows and lightning bolts launched from the tips of the rat mages' staves. The barrier had also changed to a dark crimson hue with flames flickering along its surface. This chamber took far longer to clear than the previous ones. Thalion even tested a few new combo moves that he thought would not only be effective but also look super cool.

One of his favorites was to slam into the ground while in Mistform, shifting back into his human body just before impact to perform a dramatic superhero landing, then releasing a massive mana shockwave, now tinted in dark red, that obliterated everything nearby. After gathering all the loot, his leaderboard score had climbed to just over three thousand points. Before leaving the chamber, Thalion opened the leaderboard to see how the top five were doing.

First Daughter of the Hive — 6, 340 Points Ethan, Chosen of Aeta — 6, 290 Points Meyra, Chosen of Eshara — 6, 250 Points Eric, Chosen of Solarion — 6, 000 Points Prince Vorathis of the Vorakai — 4, 450 Points Interesting. There had definitely been some shifting since the start of this new stage. The First Daughter of the Hive remained at the top, while the prince had dropped to fifth place. Two new names had appeared on the board.

Thalion had no idea who Meyra was, but he was genuinely happy that Eric had made it into the top five. Reaching exactly six thousand points was an achievement in itself, he thought with amusement. The top four were relatively close in score, while the prince lagged behind with less than five thousand. It probably all depended on who managed to reach the palaces first. There would definitely be more reshuffling in the future, especially in the higher stages.

Four thousand points wasn't that far away, and Thalion had completely skipped both the introduction and the first stage. Maybe, just maybe, he could reach the top without having to kill a chosen at all. So far, this palace had been very generous. If the dungeon kept throwing out points like this, he might even break into the top five sooner than expected.