Chapter 37: Superior Defense, Weakness Insight

Inside the pale white palace door, the remaining members of the Giant Scorpion Bandit Gang were being cornered by four earth elementals.

The earth elementals’ bodies were composed of rock, granting them formidable defense but also greatly increasing their weight, making movement extremely slow.

Thus, nearly all earth elementals had mastered the specialties of Charge and Advanced Charge to compensate for their lack of mobility.

Earth elementals possessing these two specialties gain a +6 Strength bonus during a charge.

This means they can initiate a charge at higher speed and slam into enemies.

If there were only one earth elemental, the bandits, even if outmatched,

could exploit its poor maneuverability to escape the hall.

But now there were four earth elementals; after a few charges, they had sealed off all escape routes for the bandits.

Then they slowly drove them into a corner.

The bandits were utterly desperate; having lost all room to evade, they could barely dodge the earth elementals’ attacks.

One more charge from the earth elementals would mean total annihilation.

“You monsters!”

One desperate bandit roared and charged at an earth elemental, hacking wildly.

Unfortunately, aside from dislodging a few rock chips, it had no effect on the elemental’s overall structure.

“Smack!”

With a single slap from the earth elemental, the desperate bandit was flung across the room, his internal organs shattered to death.

It wasn’t that he couldn’t dodge the slap—he simply no longer wished to.

Since escape was impossible, he had no desire to cling to life.

The others witnessed this, their hearts filled with bleakness, regretting their decision to hunt the dragon.

“It’s all that bastard Pade’s fault! I told you not to come hunt the dragon, but he forced us here just because he’s the leader.”

“Exactly! Look—he was the first to charge earlier, but now? Not even a corpse to be seen. He probably ran off.”

“F**k you, Pade—I curse you to burn in hell after death.”

The surviving bandits poured their fury and resentment into curses directed at Pade.

Strangely, no matter how much they cursed, not a single word touched the dragon or Fang Shi.

Turs watched it all, finding it utterly amusing.

“Humans are truly creatures that bully the weak and fear the strong.”

“That guy giving orders earlier—was that Pade?”

“I think I remember he was killed by a human.”

“Ran away? How laughable.”

Turs glanced again and found it boring.

So he ordered the earth elementals to finish quickly, wrap up, and go to sleep.

Hm?

Why has that human who killed Pade come back?

I clearly recall humans turning on each other just now.

This sword-wielding human was one of the factions.

He was the lone survivor of his group, and the strongest among them all.

Boring. Doesn’t matter how strong he is—anyone who disturbs my sleep deserves to die.

He then ordered the earth elementals to kill the last bandit and move toward him immediately.

Fang Shi saw the four earth elementals advancing together, and noticed not a single bandit left alive.

He wasn’t surprised at all.

Large earth elementals have a natural Armor Class of 10.

These bandits, lacking divine weapons and mostly at level 1, had nothing capable of piercing that defense.

Did they think a level-5 earth elemental was harmless?

If low-level beings could so easily defeat high-level ones, what meaning would biological levels hold?

Fang Shi used these cannon fodder merely to drain the earth elementals’ stamina.

To test Shi Long’s tactics.

He never expected any real results.

“Boom! Boom! Boom!”

The earth elementals’ stone fists slammed down,

kicking up clouds of dust and leaving the ground pockmarked with small craters.

Fang Shi darted between the elementals’ limbs, just as the bandits had done earlier.

But he was far more agile and nimble than they had been.

Especially when all four earth elementals attacked together, their massive bodies became their own hindrance.

Fang Shi used them to block attacks from other elementals, further dismantling their coordinated assault.

As for the earth elementals’ signature move—Charge—

“Boom!”

Two earth elementals crashed into each other head-on, large chunks of rock breaking off their bodies.

It was the most severe damage they had sustained since being summoned.

The reason was simple: it had been deliberately provoked and exploited by Fang Shi.

When two earth elementals prepared to charge, simply aligning their trajectories would cause them to collide.

It sounds simple, but executing it was extremely difficult.

First, high Agility or relevant specialties boosting reaction speed were required.

Only then could one react in time to the earth elementals’ attacks.

Second, sufficient Strength was needed to generate explosive power.

Only then could one dodge with enough speed when the elementals initiated a charge.

Finally, extensive combat experience and precise battlefield awareness were essential.

Only then could one create favorable small details in the chaos.

When all three were combined, the result was two earth elementals colliding.

To be honest, it wasn’t that Fang Shi didn’t want to attack the earth elementals directly.

It was just that there was an embarrassing problem.

Fang Shi’s own attacks barely pierced the earth elementals’ defense.

Against their 68 HP, it was like a drizzle.

Moreover, such attacks required full exertion, making evasion difficult.

That’s why Fang Shi resorted to making the earth elementals fight each other.

Otherwise, if every basic strike could easily deal damage, his agility would have turned them all to rubble long ago.

But the earth elementals weren’t fools; after the first collision incident,

they largely stopped using Charge in subsequent combat.

As a result, Fang Shi could no longer create any significant results.

At best, the elementals occasionally brushed or bumped into each other—damage so negligible it was meaningless.

It seemed the next phase of battle would be a test of stamina.

Whoever broke first would lose.

Turs saw this too. As a dragon, he had the power to alter the situation.

But he simply didn’t want to move; the coming hibernation had left him utterly drained.

He was either sleeping or on his way to sleep.

Just now, after a moment of peace, he was already growing drowsy again.

“Fight, fight—I’ll just watch. This human may be strong, but he has no divine weapon.”

“He can’t break through the earth elementals’ defense—they pose little threat. If he doesn’t run, he’ll eventually be worn down.”

“I’ll just sit here and enjoy the show.”

In truth, Fang Shi, with his vast combat experience, could never forget the dragon watching from the sidelines.

No matter what happened, he had contingency plans ready.

Besides—who said Fang Shi lacked the ability to pierce the earth elementals’ defense?

Now was the time!

[Weakness Insight]

[Multi-Force: Double-Strike Hand (Incomplete)]

[Multi-Force: Double-Strike Leg (Incomplete)]

A flash of sharp light seemed to pass through Fang Shi’s eyes.

Powerful force erupted from his body.

He leapt upward and thrust toward the spot on one earth elemental equivalent to the seventh rib of a human.

“Piercing Attack activated.”

“You dealt 3 damage to the target.”

"Piercing Attack initiated."

"You dealt 24 damage to the target’s energy core."

"Target received fatal damage."

"Target died."

"Absorbing target’s soul energy, you gained 210 experience points and 21 survival points."

Rustle-rustle!

With Fang Shi’s strike unleashed, the earth element before him collapsed.

The stones forming its body scattered across the ground.

The reason was that Fang Shi had shattered the earth element’s energy core.

The earth element, when summoned from its plane, had no physical body.

Only its energy core was teleported, condensing a shell from the environment of the summoning site.

Thus, the shell’s damage meant nothing.

As long as the energy core remained intact, the earth element could return safely to its plane, even after defeat.

Unfortunately, Fang Shi was one of the few who knew this secret.

Since his attacks could not inflict effective damage, he might as well strike the energy core directly and kill the earth element.

Implementing this strategy relied on the skill Weakness Insight.

"[Weakness Insight I]: Your keen eyes easily discern enemies’ vulnerabilities."

Weakness Insight I had always been the first skill Fang Shi intended to master independently.

Had it not been for the Fang Family Breathing Method, he had planned to claim a reward for acquiring this skill.

During his earlier battle against the dog-headed creatures, after prolonged combat, Fang Shi finally mastered this skill.

It was now fixed on his attribute panel, granting corresponding stat bonuses.

Thanks to this skill, Fang Shi had slain Pade and Harris more easily.

In the recent battle, after repeated probing, Fang Shi noticed the earth element consistently flinched slightly at the same spot.

Logically, earth elements had thick, rugged hides and should ignore ordinary attacks.

Even if pierced through, it would merely leave a hole—minimal impact.

Unless that spot was vital.

He thus deduced it might be where the energy core was hidden.

Amid constant movement, Fang Shi finally found an opening and struck with full force, piercing the earth element’s shell.

To the earth element, it was like a chopstick thrust into its body—3 damage proved it.

Yet it was precisely this 3-point damage that allowed Fang Shi’s sword to strike the earth element’s energy core.

He shattered the core, killing the earth element.

Crack-crack!

A sound like grinding stones echoed across the earth element’s body, accompanied by a low rumble.

It was the earth element mourning, grieving its fallen companion.

Immediately after came a storm of violent collisions.

Turs was stunned, no longer drowsy.

"How did this human do this? Is this even possible for a human?"

It was no wonder Turs was shocked—theory was one thing, execution another.

Even knowing the secret of the earth element’s energy core, how many could actually find it?

When forming its shell, the energy core’s placement depended entirely on the earth element’s whim.

There was no fixed location like a brain.

Had Fang Shi not mastered Weakness Insight I, even with vast experience, he could never have found it.

Turs realized the gravity of the situation—this human truly had the power to kill him.

He himself had no ability to kill an earth element.

It was said dragonkind was among the strongest races in the multiverse.

But "strongest" referred to overall power and growth potential.

It did not mean a creature of the same level was invincible.

Turs knew it was time to act—delay any longer and it would be too late.