Quill did the most sensible thing when a giant worm was about to eat him. He jumped towards the mouth, easily dodging the hands that were likely trying to cut him off thinking that Quill would try and run away. He then jammed a manifestation of a pillar into the creature's mouth and threw one of the jugs of poison into the monster's gullet.
This didn't have the effect he wanted, for as soon as it went into the cursed sins esophagus, a large amount of bile came up and Quill had to leap to the side and over several of the arms just to get out of the blast radius of all the vomit that came spewing out of the mouth.
It was a good thing too as the moment the bile touched the ground it caused massive hissing and it ate away through the concrete like it was nothing.
“Oh that is disgusting. But at least now we know poison probably won't work. Also I would recommend not allowing it to eat you like previously if that is what you would have to contend with. Like I love you but try not to get yourself covered in vomit please. It would just be embarrassing”
He was inclined to agree as he slashed through several of the hands and arms that were now trying to grapple him. At first he was just trying to block them but they were just too many and he quickly resorted to severing them. Even if the monster could regrow the hands and arms it still had to eat them first which meant….
An idea suddenly sprung up in his head just as he narrowly dodged another fist that tried to squish him like a bug. The cursed sin had to eat the hands in order to regrow them. So just remove the hands!
He brought his pizza cutter out and sliced through the hand that had just tried to crush him before grabbing it and chucking it into his storage space removing it entirely from the equation.
He managed to chop off four more hands before the cursed sin retracted all of its arms and let out bubbling hiss at him “I do not likessss it when the food fights back! Return my handsss to me!”
Quill responded By throwing several jugs of the highly flammable liquid he had taken from the roaches stash at the monster watching it break and spill all over its skin.
The cursed sin simply snarled at that and Quill was forced to watch as some of the fat from within the worm's body traveled up the arms that had been severed in a disgusting body horror like visual before the fat reached the end of the stumps and regrew into hands.
“ I willss devour you and everything you hold dear to make you pay for forcing me to use my precious reserves!!”
Quill clicked his tongue in annoyance as he began dodging and severing hands as much as possible while simultaneously flinging the rest of his jugs of flammable liquid onto the actual worm itself.
By the time he threw the last jug, a decent portion of the worm was covered in the liquid and he stopped trying to keep his distance in order to charge the monster. Dodging the various hands and sidestepping when the worm tried to bite him before taking out a bit of flint and steel from his storage ring and lighting the bastard up.
The cursed sin let out a horrid shriek of pain while Quill had to manifest a protective sphere around him at the sudden heat that poured out from the flammable liquid. He had not expected it to burn as hot or as brightly as it did, but that was good news for him the moment he got out of the heat's range.
“ I am not to be cooked! I am not to be cooked!” it kept shrinking over and over again as it smashed the side that was burning into the ground to try and smother out the flames. It was really freaking out over that matter, but that gave Quill enough time to manifest a sideways pile driver with his Bomb Bag at the ready.
As the monster continued to flail about, Quill fired his pile driver and impaled the creature, pinning it to the wall, all while it let out more shrieks of pain. Its hands were far more focused on trying to put out the fire than trying to remove the spike which he was more than happy to let happen as he hollowed out his pile driver and threw the bag bomb inside. After lighting the top bomb, he had his manifestation deliver the package into the monster's guts.
He knew it wasn't going to be enough, especially since there were fewer bombs than before and he was fighting an unpacified cursed sin. But any damage was good damage.
He watched as he dissipated the pile driver's manifestation making sure to keep the wound plugged as he chugged another health potion to help ease the strain on his body.
To the worms credit, it seemed to have realized something was amiss but it was too late as the body of the monster expanded followed by a muffled boom and several areas of its side ruptured open all while the fire continued to burn. It's shrieking was filled with pain and rage as it turned it's front towards him, the hands no longer caring about trying to put out the flame
“Oh boy, if you thought it was mad before it's definitely mad now. So what's the plan?”
“Ironic based punishment.” Quill said with a grin knowing he had this fight in the bag now while he began a new manifestation. One he got from the idea of how upset the creature seemed to be from being cooked. He loved eating, but it didn't seem to like being eaten.
He started to back pedal up the stairs as continued his manifestation. Normally it would take him a couple of minutes on a new manifestation to properly get the image he wanted in his head. Thankfully though he had the perfect reference material right in front of him.
His manifestation took the form of the cursed sin of gluttony front part except he ignored the lips and gave his manifestation sharp teeth as opposed to molars. Having the mouth open wide as multiple hands filled up the tunnel he was back pedaling into in order to reach him. The moment they entered the mouth, Quill snapped the jaws shut and ripped off every single hand in the process causing the monsters shrieks to become even louder which he didn’t know was possible.
After throwing the hands into his storage ring as quickly as possible and dissipating the manifestation to ensure he didn't overstrain himself. He walked back to the top of the stairs and looked down on the platform where the cursed sin was smashing its body in pain and frustration against the wall as it regrew its hands. Perhaps he was imagining it but the monster looked a lot thinner than it had before.
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“ You aren't imagining it. It is definitely thinner. I have to give you credit where credit is due. Starving out a monster that is all about gluttony seems especially cruel. I love it!”
It did seem cruel but he had grown so tired of dealing with these horrors since the start of this dungeon and system integration that he was kind of past the point of caring. Maybe this would serve as a proper warning to the next cursed sin that tried to fight him.
He took a deep breath and shouted down to the creature “Hey food! How do you like being eaten?? I got some better chompers than you and I'm feeling hungry!”
“You are terrible at trash talking” she muttered but his terrible trash talk did seem to get its attention because the cursed sin whipped its front towards Quill snarling and grinding its teeth in irritation.
“I am nots food! I eats the food! I will not be out done by one who rejects our gift! I will not sssssuffer your insolence!!!”
It didn't even launch its hands at Quill this time. Instead using its hands to leap its mouth towards Quill, its jaw practically unhinging in order to gobble him up. Obviously Quill was ready and remanifested his own mouth, making it larger than the cursed sins head and allowed the creature to leap into the awaiting Jaws before snapping them closed.
The cursed sin let out a shriek and Quill had to thrash his own jaws around several times before ripping the monster's head completely off its body. Just for good measure he had the teeth shred and grind the head as much as possible before throwing all that flesh into his storage ring.
The cursed sin body fell back to the platform and thrashed around like a headless chicken before its body visibly thinned in front of Quill while regrowing its head. Though this time said head was a lot thinner, the cheeks gaunt. Quill could even see the creature's ribs which made him unsure of what to label the creature since worms or bugs had ribs.
The flames were mostly smoldering at this point but the smell of burning flesh was dominant in the air. He was actually surprised there wasn’t much smoke now that he thought about it and wondered if the system or dungeon had something to do with it.
The monster was no longer attacking, or seemed to show any interest in attacking. It was just breathing heavily for a brief second as if trying to process what had just happened. Then without a word it turned and tried to flee down the Metro tunnel.
Quill's eye twitched when he saw the monster trying to run and manifested several javelins, hurling them into the worm's body one at a time with a simple manifested rope attached. The moment they pierced the creature's body he had the points spread and Branch out like tree branches or roots. Ripping apart and turning the monsters inside into mince meat.
The creature continued to shriek and try to pull away but Quill kept himself firmly planted at the top of the stairs and pulled back. He was not about to let this dipshit of a monster flea when he was so close to killing it and finishing this bullshit quest.
Despite that ever growing strain of his manifestation use adding up, he accelerated the Growth of the javelin's branches until finally The cursed sin let out its dying gurgling gasp and collapsed to the ground which was quickly followed by a system prompt flashing in front of Quills face.
You have killed a cursed sin of gluttony (larval) lvl 1. experience gained
The cursed sin of gluttony must find a new host and you have been selected. Congratulations!
Congratulations! The cursed sin of gluttony has been successfully suppressed.
Congratulations! The cursed sin of gluttony has been successfully purged from your being.
Congratulations! you have leveled up to lvl 34
Congratulations you have completed the quest “Kill the cursed beings infesting the tunnels!”
Accept reward?
Quill let out a breath of relief upon seeing the system prompt and quickly accepted the reward causing a small flash to happen in front of him and a small golden ticket appeared before him which he quickly snatched out of the air and tried to identify it.
E grade village ticket. High Quality
“This doesn't tell me shit.”
“ Let's ask Ssevinac what it means next time we see him then.” Was her response, though her tone had a venomous bite to it as she was likely still very mad about the cursed sin trying to get to him but before Quill could respond back another system prompt appeared in front of his face.
Congratulations! you have unlocked the “title” section of your system.
Congratulations! you have been awarded the title “lunatic”
Congratulations! you have been given the achievement “one word title”
May all who bear witness upon who you are suffer. For there shall be none greater than you.
10 stat points awarded to body, Mind, and soul
error! could not distribute to Soul. redistributing evenly to body and mind
He couldn't believe what he was reading. He wasn't sure what titles did, but he certainly found being called a lunatic to be both undeserved and insulting. He hadn't even done anything that crazy! But the stat distribution for gaining this title was insane! That was absolutely something he was going to need to ask Ssevinac when he got the chance. However, before he could think about what he was reading anymore, another system prompt appeared in front of him.
Congratulations! you have unlocked the tutorial timer!
time remaining before Tutorial ends
8 hours, 43 minutes, and 9 seconds
Quill just stared at that prompt for several seconds, and he knew they were seconds because he watched the seconds timer go down. The only thing he could think of at that moment was a giant and simple “fuck you” to the system. Now it gives him a timer???? After all of that!!! Also considering how close he is to the tutorial finishing, it might have been helpful to have the timer sooner so that way he would have had better ease and keeping track of everything!!
He spent the next 3 minutes and 27 seconds spewing out every curse and curse word word he could think of towards the system and it's bullshittery!
“Well, look on the bright side. at the very least you now know when the tutorial will end and you have finished up all quests that needed to be done. So all's well that ends well right?”
“No! All well does not end well!! All of that anxiety and pressure could have been alleviated a little if I just knew time! Is the Multiverse so small that the system can spend so much time just screwing around with me!”
she giggled in response to that before speaking. “ oh, I mean to ask but how many health potions do you have left?”
The question caught Quill off guard and he looked into his storage ring “uh… seven more, why?”
“Could you drink one now please? You are sort of hurt from the strain of the manifestations and your fight with the cursed sin.”
A little confused as to why she was asking, he obliged and drank one of the potions before she spoke again.
“Good, feel better?”
“ I guess?” he responded not sure where she was going with this
Her voice suddenly shifted from being a warm and mischievous tone to something that made him involuntarily shiver as beads of sweat began to lace his body. “Good. I think it's about time you and I have a little chat.”
