Becoming a Monster

Chapter 454: Chapter 454: The Mission Came to Them

Their team has finally departed.

By the time the walls of the city disappeared behind them, their numbers had already been cut in half.

Only sixteen were part of the group left that ventured toward the forest.

The troll subjugation paid well, but not well enough to feed and house everyone. They had tried to secure additional contracts near the forest, but the only remaining tasks required pushing deeper into the forest than they were willing to risk.

Especially not with what they had just learned.

If what they believed was true... None of them wanted to be the first to confirm it.

Besides Levi and Ishii, no one had any desire to cross paths with Noah again. So they had the others split off.

Most took missions tied to the growing zombie crisis. Entire villages had been wiped out overnight. The dead weren’t just increasing in numbers; they were getting stronger.

Stronger than the ones from their original world.

For this, Jasmine had taken a portion of their people to assist those efforts. Not because she had a heart of gold, nor was it solely for the rewards, either. For her, it was personal.

The human nations have already declared their war efforts to vanquish the undead, and the one who would be leading that effort would be Mark and Isabelle.

She could already foresee the burden that her brother would place on himself. She wanted to lessen that burden in her own way. And that meant shaving down the zombies’ numbers near her so Mark wouldn’t have to later.

It was the only way she knew how to help.

Levi had gone with her.

That decision alone had surprised nearly everyone.

When questioned, he had only smiled and explained that zombie-related missions earned higher contributions within the Mage branch. Strategically, it made sense.

Still, some of them suspected that wasn’t the only reason. It was always his conniving smile that created the doubt.

Whether it was loyalty, ambition, or something else entirely, Levi had chosen his battlefield carefully.

——

Missions to contribute to the destroyed villages were in high demand. Amara and the less than ten people still willing to follow her had traveled alongside Jasmine and Levi to a village that had just survived an attack.

That left Paul, Bailey, Ishii, Alicia, and Raven with eleven others as the trees of Ashenveil Forest began to rise in the distance. But before they could even enter the forest, they spotted a party running towards them.

Two figures were sprinting toward them.

Only two.

Both wore guild insignias, their cloaks torn and streaked with dirt. One supported the other, who was limping badly. Even from afar, the panic in their movements was obvious.

Small parties rarely took missions this close to Ashenveil alone. The guild normally posted open contracts, allowing groups to merge into standard parties of four or five.

To see two people alone here meant they were either arrogant or desperate in need of gold, so they attempted a mission on their own. Or there was the last option, the one that fit this scenario best.

They did come here with a full party, and this was all that was left.

The moment the two spotted Paul’s group, relief flashed across their faces.

But then his face froze. Paul and the others felt it before they saw it. Tremors in the ground continued to grow stronger.

The trees behind the fleeing pair shook as something large forced its way through.

Two trolls burst from the tree line.

Fresh blood smeared across their mouths and down their chins.

The woman didn’t even scream when she looked back to see. Her face only grew paler, and her eyes grew wide. She tugged on the man even harder, using every little bit of strength to reach those she hoped would be their saviors.

The man didn’t react.

His eyes were open, but empty. His sword hung loosely from his hand, scraping against the dirt as he stumbled forward. Whatever had happened behind them had already broken something inside him.

The trolls roared; the sound was more like laughter, as if they found the two people’s despair amusing.

It was a game to them, a game they were familiar with. This wasn’t the first time this has happened.

Trolls were slow creatures, but that was only when compared to creatures proportional to their own size. The distance between them closed fast.

No one needed to be commanded. Paul was their leader and their strongest, but in the end, he lacked Mark’s charisma and decision-making skills to be able to issue orders mid-battle.

Ishii seemed to react first; his sword was already drawn as he pounced forward, but there was someone else who reacted first, someone who wasn’t among their leadership. Not because she wasn’t strong, but because she was too soft spoken.

Riley had already reached behind her shoulder, slipping her hands into her quiver before Ishii had made his move. What she pulled wasn’t a normal arrow.

The shaft was dark and slightly glistening, the scent of oil clinging to it.

She had prepared for this long before they ever arrived. Their plan to fight the trolls depended, in part, on her success. If it worked and they were successful, her role would become the backbone of their victory.

With her ability to transmute arrows from materials, she coated logs with oil, letting it soak for over a day before transmuting them. Because of their mass, using a small-sized log, one big enough to place in a fireplace, she could amass ten arrows alone.

She had others, but none of these others could be mass-produced like the oiled ones.

They were a good distance away from the trolls, a distance that even a seasoned archer wouldn’t be able to hit their target accurately. Yet, Riley’s eyes didn’t waver.

From her distance, every twitch of muscle, every shift in weight, every rise and fall of the trolls’ shoulders was clear. Nothing escaped her gaze.

The arrow gave off a faint glow before she released it.

The sound wasn’t loud. It was sharp, like the wind itself had been cut in half.

The first troll didn’t even see it. The arrow struck dead center in its chest.

From its perspective, the impact was insignificant. It barely stung; at most, it was just a nuisance. The impact wasn’t strong from the troll’s perspective, nor was the damage. Its boisterous roar simply twisted to anger as it realized new prey was attacking it.

The second troll only understood something was wrong when it felt a sudden prick above its collarbone, lodging cleanly at the base of its neck.

That one was enough to cause damage.

It growled, thick fingers reaching up to tear it free. The moment it gripped the shaft, the arrow snapped in half. It was surprisingly brittle.

The troll snarled in confusion, trying to dig out the embedded tip, but its nails couldn’t grasp it. For a moment, it stalled, irritated, breath hitching as the wound closed around the lodged arrowhead.

It roared again and resumed its charge, ignoring the arrow completely.

By this time, Ishii was more than halfway to the two guild members.

When he passed them, the first troll was just meters away, and now the others were following in pursuit.

Paul’s speed increased with each stride. The change began before most noticed. Instead of his usual hardening, bronze fur sprouted across every exposed inch of skin. His muscles swelled beneath his armor.

Beneath it, his skin hardened into the same metallic hue, a bronze sheen like tempered steel.

His gauntlets and other parts of his armor strained from his new form, but they held firm. Beneath the armor, he wore nothing that would tear or bind him. He had long made preparations for this power.

Those like Bailey resented Paul’s newfound power, believing that as long as he didn’t use it, then Noah couldn’t hold any power over him. But Paul didn’t see it that way.

He would always remember that he should have been dead. This power had dragged him back from the edge. He would not insult it by refusing to use it.

More importantly, he would hate himself if he allowed those he wanted to save to die in front of him while knowing he had the power to prevent their deaths.

Unlike Paul, Raven didn’t plan to transform. Her transformation was unlike Paul’s. She couldn’t convert and revert at will. Because the change drastically affected her body, the strain on her body was immense, lingering even after she reverted.

And her power was not meant for every skirmish. It was their safeguard, their trump card, held back in case a situation was too big for them to handle.

———

Ishii had now passed the two adventurers. When he passed them, he didn’t look back. His blade slid free in one smooth motion, the steel catching the light just as the first troll closed the final stretch.

Behind them all, Riley was already drawing again.

The second shot soared just as quickly as before, striking the charging troll’s face, right underneath the eye.

Its charge broke into a stagger as its vision blurred, and one hand rose instinctively toward the embedded shaft. That single moment of imbalance was all Ishii needed.

His gaze revealed a different persona from the naive samurai kid before.

Now that Mark was gone, he needed to step up even more.