Chapter 602: Stench

Liam had no intention of becoming a good swordsman. At least, developing skills in that field wasn’t for the sake of achieving greatness in the sword.

In Liam’s perspective, the greatsword was merely a tool to infect his opponents, something extremely suitable to his predicament.

Poison masters relied on insidious and sneaky tools, but Liam didn’t have such privilege. He couldn’t limit himself to those, needing something far bulkier that could pierce his enemies’ defenses, no matter the power gap.

In a way, it was akin to choosing a better ingredient, a more suitable piece of the concoction to create the recipe for the most dreadful fiend in the world.

’Faster,’ Liam thought as he swung the hulking piece of metal. ’Better.’

The polecats might be slow for Liam, but they were small targets, barely half a meter long, and they were numerous. Their joint assault was relatively challenging to handle with such a big weapon alone, but that was exactly why Liam stuck to it.

The lack of body-enhancing pills didn’t mean Liam couldn’t become better at the basics. Actually, his archery skills proved he could go far beyond that, and it wasn’t hard to dissect what the greatsword needed.

Speed, strength, precision, and technique were the core aspects of swinging a sword, and Liam could definitely improve in at least two of them, if not all four.

Strength was easy. Liam only had to keep swinging. As incredible as his body was, physical training still improved his muscles, especially when the tool was so heavy.

Actually, if Uriah agreed to the shameless commission, Liam was more than willing to accept an even heavier greatsword.

Speed sort of fell into the same category, though instinct played a big part, too. Thoughts were anchors on actions. No matter how much strength Liam wielded, his sword would remain slower than it should be if he had to think before swinging.

Practice was the solution there, but it had to be specific. Swinging the weapon in a vacuum wouldn’t build all the instincts Liam needed. He had to keep fighting with the greatsword until it became a natural, even obvious tool in his hands, removing thoughts from the equation.

Precision theoretically also only needed practice, but technique created an additional requirement. To put it simply, Liam had none and planned to continue like that.

That wasn’t to say that Liam wouldn’t develop a personal battle style. He actually had no other option since nothing was created with his exceptional traits in mind.

Still, fighting more was key to developing that battle style, and practicing in it would bring precision, creating a cycle with no clear path. Liam couldn’t find any shortcut in those two aspects. He could only improve one battle at a time.

And so, blood spurted everywhere.

Liam didn’t retreat, nor did he release his Qi. He just swung his weapon, crushing and cleaving the creatures leaping at him. At times, he even used the greatsword’s flat sides to blow the magical beasts away, but his artificially restrained defenses still failed against the numerical disadvantage.

Polecats reached Liam’s figure, biting and scratching. They barely inflicted any damage, but they were training, too. Liam had to learn to use his huge weapon when opponents were so close after all.

It was a dance made of simple, forceful moves. Liam had no fancy sword techniques in his repertoire and didn’t seek any. They weren’t in his nature.

By the time silence arrived, Liam was at the center of a gory scene. All the polecats were dead, most being unrecognizable, the greatsword having crushed them so thoroughly that almost nothing was salvageable.

’They still stink so much,’ Liam thought, wrinkling his nose. ’Maybe their glands can work as ingredients, too.’

Following the terrible stench, Liam stored a few furred rears that had survived the onslaught before leaving the area without looking back. He wasn’t satisfied with how he had wielded the sword, and completing the perfume would allow him to refocus on hunting with it.

Liam’s return to the underground hall wasn’t as loud as he had feared. Rachel tried to restart her shenanigans, only for the stench he had carried with him to keep her at bay.

And things only worsened once Liam established his laboratory again.

Uriah had upgraded Liam’s talismans, but nothing could contain the vile scent brewing in the cauldron. His wasteful approach aimed solely at perfection prolonged the experimental phase, too, staining the hall even further.

Liam couldn’t perfect the new recipe because he ran out of ingredients, but a satisfactory product did come out. It was a flask with a pale-brown liquid, reeking of rank 2 power, and reeking in general.

’This should be enough to keep rank 3 tracking methods at bay since it’s so specific,’ Liam calculated. ’Unless the tracking method is truly exceptional.’

Grace had the cloaking dust with her, but Liam had never planned to concoct something so thorough. He only wanted to interfere with anything magical looking for him, its basic nature allowing it to express more power.

Liam had to be the first guinea pig since he had used poison from the Red Sandstorm’s centipedes as a complementary ingredient. He sprinkled a few drops of the liquid on himself, and its foul scent immediately surrounded his figure.

’It itches a bit,’ Liam studied, noting that trait on his green jade. ’It’s not poisonous, but it also shouldn’t cause discomfort. I definitely need to make the user unaffected by the stench, too.’

Those improvements were bound to arrive once Liam exhausted the flask and went through another alchemical session. Perfection was around the corner, and he had more than his devotion to his noble art driving him to achieve it.

With how much Liam sensed, that stench was truly unbearable. He could barely hold on due to his upbringing in far-from-fragrant environments, but that annoying flaw had to disappear nonetheless.

Moreover, Liam wouldn’t be the only one suffering from it, and his companion’s sheltered life reasonably caused a far stronger reaction toward what she inevitably saw as pure torture.

"Liam dear?" Rachel called, mustering a facade of confidence, which didn’t look believable at all as she crawled back when Liam approached, flask in hand.

Eventually, Rachel’s back hit the wall, and her facade completely crumbled, replaced by panic.

"Please, don’t," Rachel begged. "Anything but that. I’ll service you with my mouth as Madam First Wife does. You can even use my botto-"

Rachel couldn’t finish her line since Liam had grabbed her jaw. He didn’t need to go that far, but he honestly didn’t want to hear what else Grace had told to that pervert.

"We must stop the tracking," Liam explained. "Either use this, or I’ll bring you back to the Tribe."

Rachel inspected the flask with pure dread before taking a long look at Liam. She eventually squeezed her eyes shut, holding onto the big hand on her jaw.

"Could you at least choke me a bit while you do it?" Rachel sniffed.

Liam was about to find that resolve praiseworthy when his brain caught up with the request, making staining that incredible beauty with such a vile stench far easier.