Now at C-rank, the range at which the solid form of Profound Toxin could be separated from his body and still maintain its shape had grown multiple times greater.

Backflow too had become a ridiculous skill. Somehow he had expected it to become less effective in the relative sense, but if anything, it had just become even more powerful than it already was. At this point, under the influence of Backflow, Eik felt like he was well into B-rank territory, by his own estimation.

Whirling spouts of water rose up behind the octopus monster, hewn about its tentacles like whips. The spouts broke into millions of tiny droplets of water as they zoomed toward Eik, their potential surely deadly.

Hoping it would work, he called on Toxic Liquefaction to morph into liquid poison. His fluid body certainly became riddled with holes, but death was not a consequence. Soon vaporized by the force of their own flight, Eik returned to human form and hurled two more meter long spears at the cephalopod, the projectiles digging about half of their length into the soft tissue of its head.

But rather than wound, it simply seemed to enrage the creature as it slammed bodily into him and sent him flying back toward shore. Before he could do much more than regain his feet, the monster made landfall, its six non-tentacle legs carrying it across the ground with no issue.

Multiple vicious gouts of water sliced through the air. Again he activated Toxic Liquefaction but when he came back out, another sharp attack took him in the arm before he could even attempt to dodge or deflect it.

The sensations was that of thousands of needles rending flesh and when it passed, most of his bicep and more than half of his forearm was bloodied to a point where that might well have been the truth. With ranged capabilities like that, staying back would be a death sentence. Eik rushed in close.

He dove under a sweeping tentacle as it tried to take his head off, thirty tiny soldiers of the corps of Living Manifestation scattering in all directions from his body. A majority was instantly annihilated, but that distraction allowed Eik to ram an extra thick blue spear all the way through another tentacle.

Six or seven Living Manifestations made it through the deadly obstacle course to invade through the wounds opened by Eik's spears. Only their squishy forms allowed them to squeeze through the tiny gaps where the monster's high-ranked body had already begun to heal itself. With such impressive regeneration speed, it must have possessed a specialized ability for it.

Andihar Dayarunar had gifted their little expedition with more than thirty high quality healing potions, and Eik had only just managed to get one of them down when he was painfully buffeted by more pellets of water. Like a storm of hails they stung, leaving angry red welts on his skin where they hit. If not for the strength granted by Backflow, they would probably have maimed him badly or even outright killed him.

But the ability was taking its toll on his body, so the faster he could finish it the better. More and more of the little Living Manifestations came out, and even as they were smashed, Eik continued to release them. When a total of about twenty individuals had made it into the octopus, a majority of Eik's skin was red and swollen.

He jumped to avoid a tentacle as it cleaved the air in an overhead smash but it still got his ankle and foot, crushing the limb with the crunch of breaking bones. He groaned in pain but maintain enough focus to shift to his liquid form and invade the alien system through a wound a couple of meters further up the tentacle appendage.

Once inside a system, Toxic Liquefaction allowed him to travel through it at speeds that resembled teleportation more than anything else. Newfound control made it not too challenging to trigger a partial Accelerant on only one of the spears in the monster's head.

Along with the resulting shock wave, the power of which shocked even him, he shot out of the wound which now gushed blood profusely. The moment he was back in the air he regained his human form, toxic spears in each hand plunging into the opened gash and widening it and ripping the tissue.

Feet skidding across the extremely slippery surface of the monster's skin, Eik activated Accelerant again — this time on anything available.

Unable to find the footing to leap properly, he resigned himself to be carried off by the pulse of blue light that now erupted from every atom of the monster's body.

The air was expelled painfully from his body as the blast carried him almost straight upwards. Having expected it, he quickly regained his bearings and spun around in the air, three more spears materializing in his palm. One after the other, he hurled them downward with a thrum.

These were slimmer and were therefore buried much deeper than any of the previous ones. Movements now sluggish, the octopus monster neglected to use its tentacles to attack but sent more spouts of water for him as he hung there in free fall.

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Blue shells of toxin sprung into existence in layers in front of him, taking the brunt of the impact while the momentum threw him even further up.

With precision he thought impossible, he managed to throw two hooked harpoons through a tentacle each, pinning them to the ground, although the B-ranker could probably free pretty easily if it tried.

But before it could get that far, he took advantage of being almost fifty meters above the vicious cephalopod. Exerting himself both physically and mentally, he released as much toxin as he was capable of at once, liter after lethal liter falling like torrential rain upon the monster. The maximum number of available Living Manifestations tumbled down after it, adding to the already lethal dose.

With unparalleled enthusiasm, the eager toxin sought the numerous small wounds that had not yet begun to heal properly, invading by the gallon.

A high-pitched shriek tore at Eik's ears as the octopus was thrown into a world of pain. Not waiting around to see if it had some kind of last resort, he created a set of gliding wings and headed back toward Olivia, who stood watching further inland.

When he looked back over his shoulder to see if the beast had finally collapsed, he only just managed to catch a glimpse of the water lance before it slammed into him and sent him careening to the ground.

Landing with a dull thud, he crab walked into cover. It wouldn't protect him from another attack, but if it could conceal him just long enough for the bastard to finally die, that would be just as useful.

Several more attacks narrowly missed him but one shattered the upper part of the trunk of the tree he was sitting behind into sawdust.

With bated breath he waited, listening for any indication that another gout of water was forthcoming. After more than ten seconds, he risked a peek around the tree. The massive monster lay deflated on the beach, lifeless and unmoving.

With a glance up at Olivia he slowly came out from cover and began walking slowly back toward the thing.

"I think it's dead, bro," she called from up on the hill. "No need to be so scared."

"Ye— I know that! Obviously!" he yelled back and pushed himself to stroll in a more nonchalant manner.

The mutated octopus was still twitching by the time he got there, but the fact that the Living Manifestations all came rushing out of the monster to meet him and hop back into his skin was all he needed to be convinced of its death.

With the wakizashi he cut chunks of cephalopod flesh from both the tentacles and from the bulbous head and stuffed it into his rucksack of holding. A couple of suction cups and a few eyes also went inside. Again, for the hundredth time, he swore to himself to get around to experimenting with all the stuff he harvested. He just needed to not have a bunch of other, more urgent matters to attend to. Soon. Maybe…

Olivia landed next to the corpse, inspecting it. She circled it a couple of times, looking over the wounds and injuries inflicted by Eik. Its soft, boneless limbs and body had already grown discolored and decaying.

"How the hell—…" she muttered under her breath. "This was definitely a B-ranker. Not a high B-ranker by any means, but you annihilated it and you only just hit C-rank. I just don't— I don't understand how you did that."

"When I was your rank, I wouldn't have had a snowball's chance in hell against that thing. I thought your power relative to your peers might taper off a bit as you leveled up but your rate of advancement only seems to grow even greater with time."

"I don't know, I just killed it. I remember seeing Travis Lockwood and Jake, your biggest fire-wielding, armor-wearing fan, fight against the manticores and I couldn't even kind of follow their movements, much less react. But now, so long as I have Backflow going, I just kind of… can."

"And how do you feel?"

He looked down at his fingers as he clenched and unclenched his fist. The skin was still hanging off the flesh in dry flakes, and the pain would have had him complaining if it hadn't been much worse just moments before.

The moment he had leapt in behind the tree, he had deactivated Backflow — a feat he now found himself capable of doing with relative ease. Two of the red healing potions had followed immediately after. Taking so many was normally considered a less than tolerable risk to take but with his Resistance: Toxin which had now been merged with Profound Toxin, such worries were beneath him.

"I feel okay, actually. Definitely not great by any means, but compared to the fact that this would essentially have put me into a coma for two days before, I really can't complain. Ranking up always brings about some big improvements, right? I don't know what else I might have become capable of, but I think my toxic resistance has gone up significantly if nothing else."

"Did you get any levels?" she asked,

He pulled out the wooden plaque and let her read along with him.

[Acquired Movement Boost — Lv. 36]

[Acquired Movement Boost — Lv. 37]

"I guess using Toxic Liquefaction to dodge the attacks and travel through the circulatory system of a B-ranked monster isn't bad for progress," he said with a nod. "Duly noted."

[Acquired Living Manifestation — Lv. 34]

[Acquired Living Manifestation — Lv. 35]

[Acquired Profound Toxin — Lv. 82]

[Acquired Profound Toxin — Lv. 83]

[Acquired Profound Toxin — Lv. 84]

[Acquired Profound Toxin — Lv. 85]

"Sweeeeet!" he sang, feeling on top of the world. "I just keep going up and up!"

"Wait! There's more!" Olivia said as he was about to put away the plaque.

[Skill evolution available. Skill available for evolution — (Unique) Profound Toxin]

[Choose one]

[Profound Toxin — Eager Dispersal]

[Profound Toxin — Infected Trail]

[Profound Toxin — Perfect Consumption]

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