I'm a Stingray?

Chapter 348: Rubies and rewards!

After he repeated the same attack a few times, these odd fish were forced to meet the end of their route.

They could not withstand Timothy's reign of terror, so the only option for them was to join the afterlife, wherever the heck such creatures went after they died.

Once these enemies died, the crystals that they loved so dearly, shattered into thousands of pieces.

They did so, before all fifteen of these individual piles, joined together and formed into a half-foot wide, flawless ball.

He still wasn't sure how pieces of shiny stone could behave like that, but the ball itself didn't prove hostile in any way at the moment, so he didn't want to prove difficult either.

As expected, the large ball headed towards the route which the hero had taken before.

But seemingly due to size differences, this ball didn't travel at record-breaking speeds but slowly rolled through the tunnel instead.

"I still have no idea how a crystal can work like that," Timmy mumbled.

[I might have figured it out,] The system interrupted.

And then unapologetically continued, [Those shards were each filled with a strong soul. The space worm's souls can't possibly be in these shards, so those lifeforms probably belonged to other creatures.]

[Now whichever original animals those souls belonged to, I think that they have somehow figured out how to use these powerful crystals]

[They used those shards to store their own souls in them, and the muddy fish they formed themselves into, was primarily achieved with the aid of the crystals they've trapped themselves in]

The hero needed an unhealthy amount of time to figure out what the system said, but eventually he caught up.

And once he did, the sea-pancake almost found enough reasons to appreciate all that effort these darned enemies put in.

Yet he was still confused towards some certain aspects, so he had to clear out such conclusions all for the sake of curiosity.

"You're saying that some ancient souls, have waited for any powerful crystals so they could rise back from the dead?" He questioned.

[That would be the proper definition, yes]

[I advise you to reap such souls as much as you can, your soul density has permanently tripled even though you just stole a fourth of their souls]

"Well damn..." He mumbled.

And then expressed, "It would be stupid to let these souls escape either way, so you have a point."

[Now there's the matter of the reward,] The system interrupted the other's train of thoughts.

"There's a reward?" He screamed.

[Yes,]

[You technically killed fifteen enemies a moment ago. For that you received one-hundred and twenty-seven system points as a reward]

[Now since those souls aren't a part of any species that I recognize, we can only push them to the tasked-kill category]

"Again? Damn this place's making me filthy rich." He celebrated quite loudly.

[Indeed,]

[However, at the moment you have fifty-six tasks marked as complete. Naturally, your primary bars have increased once more]

"This has to be a dream. I'm not stuck in that mating-cycle am I? All of this isn't a delusion?" Timmy pressured.

It was no secret that he joked to a certain extent, all of these gains simply seemed too much.

[This isn't a delusion,] The system answered.

And then continued, [Your primary bars are now the following...]

[Health bar = 160/160 points]

[Hunger bar = 25/25 points]

Sleep bar = 56/56 points]

Stamina bar = 25/25 points]

"Never thought that I would see these things upgrade this early," He admitted.

And then weighed in, "Now I'm actually happy to see weird fish like those ones."

[There's always a reward in the path of discovery,] The system assured.

And then reminded, [Speaking of that matter, you'll also get a reward for putting your life on the line to get close to these odd creatures]

[Two-hundred system points have been given to you as a reward,]

[Total system points = eighteen-hundred and sixty]

For that matter the hero lightly celebrated, "Good enough, but I'll probably buy more upgrades soon."

[Get used to these new ones first,] The system encouraged.

He needed a moment to comprehend everything that just happened. But once he grasped a good understanding, he only found it reasonable to continue this journey.

Luckily the sea-disk met with the end of the tunnel soon after, and was blessed with a scene that proved itself both expected and yet stunning!

His vision was once more captured with a lot of crystals, but they didn't share a green colour.

All he could see was a bloody-red shade instead. So the best assumption was that these gems were rubies, rather than crystals.

The amount of material here would make a whole country rich! As a whole one-hundred meter wide cavern was filled with them!

Every inch of this place was covered with the same expensive stone, so it became a bit difficult to manoeuvre his way around this place.

Sure there were tall and thick gems, along with short-looking fat chunks, which all together added detail in this area; but that wasn't much help.

It was so confusing to swim around here, that he forgot what tunnel he came out of once he swam twenty meters away from it.

He peeked at the cavern's walls and noticed that there were several holes on it, which likely led to expansive tunnels.

Such an aspect had no other option but to be a problem later on, but he didn't want to think about that at the moment.

So he dwelled deeper into the cavern, and hoped to advance the team task he had been given.

He was supposed to find some kind of orb around here. So now he wanted to figure out if there was an item in this area, that represented such an exact form.

A moment later he met with what seemed like a pool. It was the only thing here that didn't have a crimson red colour.

Instead this pool was coated with a light-blue type of liquid. As for what this darned heavy substance actually was, Timmy did not have the slightest clue.