Chapter 242: Horned?!

Darion summoned two Yuimons immediately. The creatures materialized in the space between the group and the approaching sound, their massive bodies appearing with a faint green glow.

The archers saw them appear, and the nearest ones took an involuntary step back.

They had seen this before, they had watched him summon creatures in battle, but it didn’t get less startling.

The sheer size of the Yuimons, the way they seemed to appear from nowhere, the green glow of their eyes, it was always jarring.

The Yuimons oriented toward the sound and went still, waiting. Their bodies were tense, their circular mouths open, their senses locked onto whatever was coming.

They didn’t move, didn’t make a sound. They just waited.

Then the source of the footsteps came into view.

Five Horned Yuimons.

Darion stared at them. He knew it. He knew how Yuimons approached someone now.

He had learned a lot from his last hunt with Seren. They always saw their prey from afar, or maybe smelled them? They should be more logical.

But whatever their method, they always did the same thing. They spotted their target, and then they just ran so fast toward them.

And the thing was, they didn’t even do it silently like a Slitherer or a Bogart.

They didn’t need to. Together, they knew how strong and powerful they were.

They knew that nothing in the forest could stand against them. So sneaking on their predator or not sneaking, it was the same thing. They announced their presence because they knew they would win.

Now these Yuimons were running at them, they didn’t look so "Yuimon."

Darion knew what a normal Yuimon looked like. He had thirty of them in his inventory. He understood the scale, the weight and the threat level of a standard specimen.

These were not standard specimens.

The horns were the obvious difference, single forward-curving protrusions from the skull that looked like they were designed specifically to end anyone quickly.

They were thick, sharp, and deadly. A single charge from one of these creatures could impale a man through his armor.

But the horns were not the only difference. These were larger.

Their bodies were bulkier, their limbs thicker, their muscles more defined.

They moved with confidence, the way things moved when they weren’t accustomed to being threatened. They didn’t hesitate, didn’t slow down, didn’t assess either. They just came.

The archers had pulled back. Not running — they weren’t stupid, they were trained better than that — but every one of them had instinctively increased the distance between themselves and whatever was about to happen.

They formed a loose semicircle behind Darion, their bows raised, their arrows ready. They were now very close to him, their protector. The one to save them. Their savior.

Darion felt their eyes on him, felt their trust, their hope. He didn’t have time to acknowledge it. He was already moving.

Words appeared across his vision:

[Threat Level: Very High.]

He didn’t need the system to tell him that. He could see it in the way the creatures moved, in the way they held themselves. These were not ordinary Yuimons. These were something else.

He summoned all remaining Yuimons from his inventory simultaneously.

Thirty of them materialized in a ring around the group, their massive bodies forming a wall of flesh and bone.

Then thirty knights. The green light came in waves as they materialized, and he was already directing them through the binding before the light faded, knights into the trees, positioned above the Horned Yuimons’ likely advance angles, Yuimons on the ground as the forward force.

He shouted at the archers to shoot for the eyes.

The archers raised their bows.

Seren was already pointing at the nearest one, already telling Pannett something specific.

Her hand moved in a quick, sharp gesture, directing the archer’s attention to a gap in the creature’s armor near its eye.

Pannett released the shot.

The arrow found the eye of the lead Horned Yuimon at a distance that should have been difficult and wasn’t.

The creature staggered, its momentum faltering as it tried to shake off the sudden blindness. Blood poured from the wound, dark and thick, and the creature let out a roar of pain and confusion.

The other archers followed. Not all shots landed clean, but enough did that three of the five were compromised before the melee started.

One arrow struck a creature’s leg, slowing its charge. Another found a gap in the armor near the neck. A third hit a shoulder, causing the creature to stumble.

The archers were buying time, creating openings for what came next.

Then Ghet Ulg and the powerful knights dropped from the trees.

It was fast and brutal.

The knights landed on the Horned Yuimons with the weight of their momentum, their weapons driving deep into the creatures’ flesh.

Ghet Ulg was the first to strike, his massive axe swinging in a wide arc that carved through armor and bone.

The creature he hit went down instantly, its body crumpling under the force of the blow. The other knights followed, their movements precise and efficient.

The five Horned Yuimons, creatures that had probably never encountered serious organized resistance in this forest, went down one by one.

The last one took longer than the others and required three knights and a Yuimon working together to finish, but it went down.

Its body crashed to the ground, its final roar fading into silence.

Silence...

The forest was quiet again, the only sounds the heavy breathing of the archers and the soft rustle of leaves settling back into place. The group stood frozen, their weapons half-raised, their eyes wide. Nobody moved. Nobody spoke either.

The system notification appeared. [Congratulations on killing five Horned olfs] [Animal Inventory expanded!]

[STATUS]

Name: Darion

Title: Baron of Percvale

Class: Necromancer

Rank: Acolyte

Territory: Percvale (Border Domain)

Territorial Resonance: Low (Starving-aligned — Improving)

[ATTRIBUTES]

Strength: 95 [+8]

Agility: 82 [+7]

Endurance: 100 [+9]

Vitality: 84 [+8]

Perception: 84 [+7]

Intelligence: 123 [+8]

Willpower: 100 [+8]

[Knight Undead Inventory: 143/150]

[Animal Undead Inventory: 70/100] [NEW!]

His attributes had jumped across every stat large jumps, larger than anything a single encounter should produce.

He read through them and realized this wasn’t just for today. The system had been accumulating points from things he had done since the last notification, the desert thieves, the journey, everything, and this was the trigger that released them all.

The animal inventory was now at one hundred slots. He looked at the five dead Horned Yuimons on the ground and felt something close to gratitude toward the system’s timing.

He had room now. He could finally add the birds.