The Tatoa Beasts were barely two hundred meters away from Kirish.
They were so fast that they were bound to reach him in just a few moments.
Holding the rented Silver Sword in his hand, which was shining brightly, Kirish took a precise stance.
This was Spirit, the second form of the Heart of the Sword.
Its range was thirty meters. This might look quite small, but for Kirish, it was more than enough.
The eyes of the Tatoa Beasts were completely red, filled with the lust of hunger. The scorching heat pouring down from the sky was a normal thing for them.
Kirish looked into the eyes of one Tatoa Beast. It was running at full speed with its mouth wide open, just one meter away from entering Kirish's range.
But in the very next instant, Kirish completely vanished from that spot.
The Tatoa Beast's body overshot and moved far ahead.
The Tatoa's pride lay in its long neck and the sharp claws of its feet.
A second later, Kirish reappeared at the exact same spot from where he had vanished. This time, two Tatoa Beasts were charging at him. Kirish stepped slightly forward, executed his move, and vanished again. Once more, the Tatoa Beasts missed their mark and ran ahead.
The first Tatoa Beast that had overshot looked back, let out a loud shriek, and crashed heavily to the ground with a loud thud.
There was a clean, sharp cut right on its neck.
This time, about five Tatoa Beasts were right in front of him. Kirish charged forward.
He bypassed one, cutting it instantly, and delivered a heavy kick to the second one. In this move, he had used Light Axe and canceled his Heart of the Sword domain.
In Light Axe, Kirish used Qi in his legs, making them act like real cutting axes.
Moving forward, Kirish did something very unusual.
Along with Heart of the Sword, he mixed the first step of Wing of Fire—the Hundred Feathers Punch.
Because of this, the three Tatoa Beasts standing in front of him were killed at the exact same time.
He had been fighting for about three minutes now, and he had completely finished off all fifteen Tatoa Beasts. He took a brief moment to catch his breath. From the start of the chaos until this moment, it had been exactly ten minutes.
This meant that from leaving the Martial Hall until now, all the fighting took only ten minutes.
The army backup was expected to arrive at the location within the next five to seven minutes. Even though Kirish had obtained this power for his own sake, his actions had inadvertently saved the lives of many people trapped there.
From a distance, Priyanka and Kevin had caught a glimpse of Kirish when he stepped out and started slaughtering those Tatoa Beasts.
They finally understood that when Kirish said he had a plan to escape, his plan was actually to fight those beasts.
Right now, the monsters standing in front of Kirish were the Manto Beasts. They were slower than the Tatoa Beasts, but they were significantly more dangerous.
They looked like rhinoceroses from Earth. Along with their long bone spikes and thick hide, they possessed an extra eye right in the middle of their forehead, which gave them incredibly sharp vision against enemies. They could understand and read an enemy's attack from a distance.
Since Kirish's attacks were based on pure martial arts, he wasn't worried about his moves being read. He was only interested in the information provided by the System.
The System stated that none of the Tatoa Beasts here possessed an Energy Core because they belonged to a very backward and weak species among monsters.
However, the Manto Beast was an A-Grade Monster, which are considered true beasts. There was a 1% chance that a Manto Beast would carry an Energy Core inside its body.
This Energy Core could reduce the severe side effects currently happening to his body by about fifty percent, or he could sell it at a very high premium price.
The System had probably calculated everything in advance, which is why it gave Kirish these side-effect pills, whose benefits were good but the side effects were terrible.
Kirish knew very well that his current sword and strength might fail to handle this type of armored monster. Therefore, he questioned the System:
"System, do you have a paralytic poison?"
["Of course, Owner! As the saying goes: throw the coin, watch the show. Tell me, how much poison do you need and what budget are we talking about?"]
Kirish purchased three bottles of paralytic poison from the System. One bottle cost one thousand W. Right after the purchase, Kirish asked the System another question:
"By the way, how much have I earned by killing the Tatoa Beasts so far?"
The System paused for a second, as if calculating the ledger, and then replied:
["Well, a full Tatoa Beast carcass normally fetches five thousand W in the market. However, the price fluctuates based on their condition. Because of the clean and surgical way you killed them, keeping their organs and body parts completely intact, I will award you seven thousand W per Tatoa. Your total earnings stand at one hundred and five thousand (105,000) W!"]
A wide smile appeared on Kirish's face.
He hadn't even killed a first-grade variant beast yet, and he had already made a handsome profit. Imagine what would happen when he started slaughtering the true beasts!
["Oh, yes! Along with that, you have also earned 100 Respect Points, which you can use to gain significant assistance from the System in the future!"]
Kirish couldn't quite understand the mechanism of Respect Points at the moment, but he didn't have the time anyway. Right in front of him stood a massive Manto Beast, twenty meters long and six meters tall, which was about to collide with him in a matter of seconds.
Kirish charged forward at full speed. His velocity was a staggering one hundred meters per second.
While sprinting, Kirish uncapped the bottles and coated his blade with the paralytic poison.
The moment he was just ten meters away, he deployed Heart of the Sword and Wing of Fire simultaneously.
Heart of the Sword granted him a controlled domain area, while Wing of Fire provided a massive fire-range within that zone.
In a single instant, Kirish struck a hundred different spots simultaneously.
The attack completely destroyed one eye and the ears of the Manto Beast, and the poison rapidly entered its bloodstream, weakening it aggressively.
Within ten seconds, the behemoth faltered while running, letting out a painful shriek as its heavy body dragged along the concrete and crashed down with a massive thud.
Kirish knew he had to finish the beast right now. He quickly leaped onto its head and drove the sword deep inside its brain.
The paralytic poison had not only immobilized the Manto Beast but had also loosened and weakened its tough skin. After skidding a little further on the ground, the Manto Beast came to a complete stop.
Suddenly, a powerful aura expanded around Kirish.
He had broken through to the Middle Stage of Level 1, causing his speed and physical strength to scale up even further.
Kirish leaped down from the rhinoceros's head.
Stepping onto the street, he slowly quickened his pace, advancing steadily toward the remaining Manto Beasts. A deep thirst flashed in his eyes.
The skin over his face had become even more veiny than before, and the itching and pain throughout his body were completely unbearable.
But Kirish was not going to stop now.
[To Be Continued...]