Monster Hunting 401: A LitRPG Fantasy Adventure by Andrew Karevik (book suggestions .TXT) 📗

“And there’s no reason to be not, not excited,” he countered. “We’re not making much progress here alone, so I think a little hope is in order.”

A deep groaning sound from within the woods seemed to disagree with Trig’s words. It was like a croak, a terrible, guttural croak from something far bigger than whatever we had faced before.

Trig immediately drew a bomb and shuffled backwards, away from the footprints. We’d have to argue about human presence later.

I noticed that the little monkey atop Trig’s head had become alert, sitting up and looking around. Its eyes widened as it tilted to the right, focusing in on something in the darkness. Could it see in these conditions?

I decided to test this question, quickly aiming in the direction that Little Hig was staring and releasing an arrow.

“Grooooahhhhhhhh,” came a reply from the darkness as my arrow struck something hard. There was a splurch sound and my motion senses triggered instantly. Something huge, maybe twenty feet tall, was dead ahead of us. One moment, it was standing still, the next it was in the air, sailing upwards high over us and coming down hard.

“Clear the area!” I shouted, leaping out of the way. Trig’s reflexes weren’t as fast as mine, but my warning was enough to get him out of the danger zone. He jumped to the side as a huge, dark green mass came hurtling down from the sky, crashing into the ground.

The earth shook as the mass landed and I worked to keep my balance, aiming my arrows at the round, dark green ball, firing shot after shot.

“Groooah,” the beast roared as it stuck its head up from the ball, revealing a pair of massive black horns, curled around each side of its head. The creature was froglike in many ways with a round body, squat legs and a big bubble protruding from its neck as it croaked. Its eyes were dark yellow and they narrowed on me almost instantly as it turned to face me, maneuvering on pencil thin legs that seemed ridiculous in contrast to the thickness of its circular body.

“Ugh, that stench,” Trig gasped as the beast croaked once more, small flaps opening up around its hideous rubber skin, releasing bursts of green mist. The young hunter staggered backwards and reeled over, retching and vomiting, stuck in one place.

My eyes watered as the smell reached me; it wasn’t toxic but it was noxious enough to make me sick. Thankfully, my own filthiness from the journey had given me somewhat of a resistance to such smells and I was able to hold my breath, ignoring the terrible smell long enough to fire a shot at one of the open flaps.

The frog beast leapt out of the way as soon as my arrow flew free, moving towards me at an incredible speed. If I had not seen such a big thing move with my own eyes, I would not believe it was capable of moving at all!

I rushed forward, underneath its body, firing arrows upwards as I dodged the beast’s slam attack. The hits didn’t seem to do much, for the creature did not react to the arrows as they lodged into its body. Despite its huge size, it seemed immune to my giant-killer abilities.

“What’s going on?” I said, realizing that the bonuses I normally got weren’t kicking in. A creature of this size should absolutely be taking extra damage from my hits.

“How can…you…breathe?” Trig gasped, finishing his puking and collapsing onto the floor. Was he out of the fight already?

“Get it together,” I ordered, taking a moment to switch to my flame arrows. If fire bothered the darkness, maybe it would bother this creature.

“I’m trying,” Trig grunted, though he was still clutching his stomach, unable to do anything.

The frogbeast landed just on the edge of the darkness and began to rotate to face us. It let out another deep croak, its throat expanding into a bubble, just like a regular frog. With a shrug, I took the shot, wondering if this creature would really have such an exposed weak point. My flaming arrow moved through the air, lighting up the area as it struck true.

The large bulbous sack merely ignored the shot as the beast croaked some more. More flaps opened up and noxious gas came gushing out. I was able to quickly pour some of our water on my scarf then wrap it around my nose and mouth, to create a filter. I could still smell the gas, but the density of the soaked scarf kept the toxicity from getting in.

“It just absorbs my shots like nothing,” I grumbled. “And it’s immune to my size-modifying abilities.”

As I tried to calculate some way to fight back, a tongue shot out from the beast’s mouth, wrapping clean around me. I didn’t have a chance to react; the tongue was too quick. The long, pink appendage draped around my shoulders and began to squeeze me tightly, pulling me towards it. My feet dug into the ground, however, and I was able to resist its pull, though not enough to stop it.

“Tri—” I tried to say, but as the beast’s mouth was open, a billow of noxious fumes hit me and I was no longer able to resist it. The world spun up and down, and though my stomach held itself together, my legs buckled and I felt the tongue yank me towards the maw.

“No, not again!” I hissed. The realization that I was about to be inside another beast’s digestive tract seemed to give me a burst of energy and I snapped into action. My arms were forced at their sides, yes, but I still had use of my legs. It wanted to hold onto me? Fine, let’s see how far its tongue could go!

Using all of my strength, I sprang backwards. My normal jump height was forty feet, so it was safe to say I generated a significant amount of force to kick off