Devouring Dragon Heir-Chapter 48: Ch Defeating the SSS rank Hydra

"Congratulations on reaching A-rank, Mr. Klaus! Will you like to proceed, sir?"

"Is that even a question? Of course, I do," Klaus snickered, a sound of pure disdain escaping him as if he disdained her doubt about whether he will continue or not.

However, Ria was too stunned by his performance to notice his subtle mockery.

She just continued the assessment, her hands moving on the console almost automatically, and stepped away from the microphone, needing a moment to compose herself.

As soon as the trial started again, the next monster materialized. This time, it was a colossal flying vulture-type monster, its virtual wings spanning dozens of meters, its sharp talons poised.

Usually, these types of monsters attacked either from a great distance, launching projectiles, or they would dive directly down at incredibly high speed to hit the enemy with a devastating impact.

"Will I gain a flying skill from that thing?" Klaus mused, a flicker of interest in his mind. A flying skill would be incredibly useful.

[No, Host. You may gain wings from absorbing its essence, but those are not what you need for sustained flight.

The Host should look for a special type of wings for himself, related to his Bloodline.]

the System replied, its voice guiding him.

"Well then, let’s hold this talk later. We have a chicken to kill," Klaus said, his attention returning to the giant virtual bird.

He simply stood in his place, looking up at the monster hovering in the sky, making no immediate move to close the distance.

His sword, Lost Echo, began to shine with a brilliant, intense red glow, infused with the full power of his Fire Affinity.

Ria, outside in the monitoring room, looked on in shock.

"He can control fire too???" she whispered, her eyes wide.

till now klaus had not used his fire anywhere in the assesment, which meant that he still had alot of tricks up his sleeve and this may not be his last stage of the assesment. He may go up the S rank.

Klaus, meanwhile, simply drew a deep breath.

He then unleashed the Third Form - Star Sword’s Cry, infused with his concentrated fire element. A beam of pure, superheated star energy, imbued with the destructive power of fire, shot towards the sky.

It traveled with blinding speed, striking the colossal vulture directly in its head.

The monster’s head exploded in a shower of pixels and virtual gore, and its massive body plummeted to the ground, disintegrating upon impact.

Ria stood there dumbfounded at the sheer absurdity and overwhelming power of the attack.

Her mind struggled to process what she had just witnessed.

An D-rank hunter, in his second assessment, had just effortlessly one-shot an S-rank monster, and with an element he hadn’t even displayed before.

She immediately dialed a number on her phone, her fingers fumbling slightly. This was beyond her pay grade.

Klaus, however, anticipating what might happen next, continued the trial without pause.

An SS-ranked Hell Hound, a massive, three-headed fiery beast, appeared in front of him, its eyes glowing with malevolent intent.

He simply infused his sword with the chilling power of ice, its blade now glowing with a brilliant blue light.

He then activated Apex Velocity, becoming an invisible blur.

Before the Hell Hound could even fully materialize or unleash its fiery breath, Klaus had already moved.

He finished the game before it even started, a single, devastating strike piercing its head, causing it to dissipate.

Meanwhile, Ria returned from her phone call, sweating profusely. Her face was pale.

She thought a level had been skipped, that the system had somehow malfunctioned, so she had to look at the replay.

Watching the replay, seeing Klaus infuse his sword with ice this time, her hands trembled even more. An SS-rank hunter with mastery over two elements. This was unprecedented.

The shock on Ria’s face was not short-lived since a huge monster appeared in front of klaus, one even Ria had seen for the first time.

This was no ordinary creature. In front of Klaus appeared an SSS-rank Hydra, a colossal serpentine beast with a length of about five hundred meters, easily matching the height of several skyscrapers stacked end-to-end.

Though this particular Hydra was not submerged in water, its sheer size and power made it dangerous nonetheless.

Klaus, maintaining his composure, simply started attacking the Hydra.

He engaged it with his sword skill, Stellar Sword Descent, and activated Apex Velocity moving with blinding speed, a blur of motion, aiming to slice through its heads.

Surprisingly, the Hydra was able to match his speed, its immense serpentine body coiling and striking with unexpected agility, its multiple heads moving in a coordinated, defensive dance.

This immediate parity in speed told Klaus something important about the limitations of his Apex Velocity skill which had earlier crossed the limitations of an A ranked skill was now perhaps reaching the limit, or perhaps these were the true capabilities of an SSS-rank monster.

[It’s not just because of Apex Velocity, Host, it is just an a rank skill whose effects sits well with your innate speed.

Your physique is also half responsible for this speed.

Remember, you took two iron-ranked pills for improving your body condition, which significantly boosted your base physical stats.

The combination of your physical attributes and the skill’s multiplier determines your effective speed.] the System clarified, its voice direct.

"Well, talk later about this, System," Klaus muttered, his focus entirely on the colossal beast before him.

"I just want to defeat this snake first of all." He needed to adapt his strategy.

When he noticed that the Hydra was consistently dodging his direct attacks, its heads weaving out of the path of his sword, Klaus felt a familiar sensation.

His Draconic Pride began to act up. It urged him to immediately use all his hidden powers, to unleash everything he had and bring the creature down in a single, overwhelming strike, asserting his absolute dominance.

The urge was strong, almost irresistible.

Klaus’s brain churned at superfast speeds, processing information and calculating probabilities.

He consciously forced himself to stay rational at all times. He knew he could not show the S-rank or SS-rank skills he had absorbed from the dungeon bosses.

If he did, his identity as the "Gate-Eater" would be exposed in a minute.

The Association’s veteran hunters would immediately detect the similarity between the skills and he might be suspeted.

Although monsters did drop skill books sometime even if rare, klaus had no history of visiting the dungeons on official records.

He needed to maintain his cover, at least for the duration of this assessment.

Finally, he decided on a course of action that balanced his power with his need for discretion. He activated Crystal Garden (S).

Instantly, huge, jagged ice crystals, varying in size, began to erupt from the virtual battlefield, piercing the ground and disrupting the smooth surface.

Along with this, he used the Terrain Transformation effect of the skill to make the ground a treacherous landscape of smaller, razor-sharp ice shards.

This was designed specifically to disrupt the Hydra’s movements, to hinder its immense speed and agility.

The Hydra had five heads, meaning it had five pairs of eyes, making it extremely difficult to find a blind spot or approach it unseen.

Klaus had to find a tactical advantage.

Thinking along those lines, Klaus leaped across the newly formed, treacherous terrain with great speed, using the crystals as temporary footholds.

He moved with calculated precision, aiming to get directly behind the massive Hydra’s coiled body.

The Hydra, despite its speed, tried to closely follow his movements, but its massive, multi-headed body made turning and reorienting itself a slow, cumbersome process.

Its immense size became a disadvantage in the crystal-filled terrain.

This was exactly when Klaus closed the distance between himself and the Hydra, directly going for its vulnerable neck, aiming for the point where its heads connected to its main body.

He jumped, propelled by his enhanced physique and the subtle use of his ice manipulation, and swiftly swung his sword, Lost Echo.

His immense strength, combined with the razor-sharp edge of Lost Echo, cleanly sliced through one of the Hydra’s heads.

The colossal head, severed from its body, slumped to the ground and dissolved into pixels.

The Hydra, now with only four heads left, twitched uncontrollably.

A wave of raw, unadulterated fury surged through its remaining heads, and it almost went berserk. Its other four heads immediately reacted, spewing torrents of highly concentrated, corrosive poison into the air.

The atmosphere around Klaus rapidly became thick with the toxic, green mist, making the air poisonous.

Although Klaus’s physical body in the VR pod would not actually die from the virtual poison, he would still experience severe disorientation, visual impairment, and a simulated loss of stamina.

He had to move away from the immediate area.

Thankfully, the space was an open grassland, not an enclosed cavern, which allowed him room to maneuver.

He considered activating his Blizzard (S) skill to dissipate the poison, but that would be a mistake. He would be caught using a skill clearly absorbed from the Yeti boss.

Even though he was confident he could weave truth and lies to fabricate a perfect story for the Association, explaining how he acquired such a skill, he knew it would involve too much distracting hassle.

Why engage in such complex deception when he could just deal with the immediate problem smartly and discreetly?

As he made some distance from the expanding poisonous cloud, he noticed something critical on his Omniscient Tracking display.

The poison, rather than simply being a damaging agent, also had subtle regenerative effects on the Hydra, albeit slow ones. The creature was slowly healing from the damage he had inflicted, drawing sustenance from its own toxic environment.

He had to do something fast, something that would not expose his hidden skills.

Klaus summoned all his available mana, focusing it intensely.

He swiftly activated Crystal Garden (S) again, this time specifically to make a dense garden of smaller, jagged icicles directly around the Hydra.

This did not inflict significant damage on the already injured beast, but it effectively restricted its movements, trapping its massive coils among the sharp ice formations.

Its ability to maneuver and spew poison was severely hampered. Then, without hesitation, he used his Star Sword Beam, but this time, he meticulously infused both the chilling power of ice and the searing heat of fire into the attack.

This created a destructive, volatile combo, a beam of superheated, freezing energy. The combined elemental attack hit the Hydra very badly, burning its flesh with intense heat and simultaneously freezing its internal structures, causing massive, internal damage.

The poison cloud, which the Hydra was continuously regenerating, began to dissipate. The continuous regeneration was now being used to counter the internal damage from Klaus’s attack.

Klaus moved swiftly, utilizing the remaining ice crystals as launchpads, until he reached a point from where he could leap into the air.

He executed a powerful jump, soaring above the struggling Hydra, and with rapid movementum, sliced through two more of its heads. The two heads detached and dissolved, leaving only two remaining.

The Hydra twitched uncontrollably, clearly on its last breath, its massive body writhing in agony.

Klaus simply walked towards it, his movements calm and deliberate.

He pierced his sword into both of the remaining heads, one by one, ensuring their complete destruction.

The SSS-rank Hydra dissolved into a shower of pixels, signifying its defeat.

This final act ended the assessment.

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AUTH NOTE

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