Chapter 289: Fighting the Dungeon Boss (2)

The sandworm slammed its tail against the canyon floor, shattering the bedrock and sending a targeted earthquake ripping toward Solomon’s position. The ground buckled and splintered. Solomon bounded off the fracturing stone, staying airborne as spikes of rock erupted from the fissures below.

While Solomon was mid-air, the sandworm snapped its body like a whip. Hundreds of the razor-sharp thorns lining its hide detached and shot through the air like a barrage of deadly javelins.

"Oh shit! I did not expect this!"

Solomon spun the spear in a rapid, defensive wheel. The multi-tipped weapon sparked violently as it batted the incoming thorns away, but the sheer volume of the barrage was overwhelming. Two of the sharp spikes grazed his left shoulder and thigh, slicing through his makeshift toga and drawing deep lines of blood.

He landed heavily on a stable slab of rock, ignoring the stinging pain as his immortal heart instantly kicked in to knit the flesh back together.

The beast reared back, preparing to unleash another torrent of corrosive acid.

"I am not letting you do that again," Solomon muttered.

He dropped his center of gravity and rushed forward, completely ignoring the toxic puddles smoking on the ground. He channeled a massive surge of silver aura into the shaft of his spear. He needed to close the distance and inflict critical damage before the beast could utilize its ranged arsenal again.

As the sandworm launched the geyser of acid, Solomon executed a slide across the bedrock, passing directly beneath the deadly spray. He sprang upward, launching himself directly at the monster’s exposed underbelly.

He drove the serrated spear upward with explosive, giant-enhanced strength. The multi-tipped head punched clean through the beast’s thick armor plating.

The sandworm roared in agony, thrashing its body violently to shake him off. It coiled around, attempting to crush Solomon within its massive, spiked folds like a constrictor snake.

Solomon realized he was about to be crushed between tons of grinding, spiked muscle. However, he did not pull the spear out. Instead, he abandoned his weapon entirely, letting go of the shaft as the coils closed in.

He dropped back down to the bedrock, narrowly avoiding the crushing embrace. The beast writhed, its own tightening coils driving the embedded spear even deeper into its own flesh.

Solomon did not pause to admire his handiwork. He sprinted toward the nearest shattered sandstone mountain and grabbed a boulder, which was a chunk of rock the size of a modern skyscraper, and hoisted it over his head with both hands.

His silver aura flared brilliantly, reinforcing his giant muscles to bear the impossible weight.

The sandworm finally untangled itself, bleeding heavily from the spear wound. It locked its eyeless, gaping maw onto Solomon and lunged forward for a desperate, full-body strike.

"Catch," Solomon roared.

He hurled the colossal boulder directly into the path of the charging beast. The sandworm collided head-on with the massive rock. The impact was cataclysmic. The boulder shattered into thousands of pieces, but the sheer force completely halted the monster’s momentum, stunning it and leaving its massive head pinned against the canyon floor.

Solomon immediately leaped high into the air, bringing both of his aura-coated fists together above his head. He plummeted downward like a silver meteor, driving a double-handed hammer strike directly onto the exact spot where the spear was still embedded in the beast’s hide. 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

The punch drove the serrated weapon entirely through the monster’s body, pinning the sandworm permanently to the solid bedrock beneath.

Solomon stood over the pinned beast, panting heavily as he waited for the massive carcass to dissolve into dungeon ash.

However, it was fundamentally still a worm. It possessed a hydrostatic skeleton and lacked a centralized nervous system, making it incredibly difficult to kill with a single strike.

The colossal beast thrashed violently, but not to attack. With a sickening, tearing sound, the sandworm simply detached its upper torso from the pinned section of its spine. It tore its own body completely in half, leaving the severed tail end impaled on the bedrock.

The main head section immediately dove straight back into the loose sand, disappearing from sight in a frantic bid for survival.

Solomon stared at the twitching, severed tail section pinned to the rock.

’It just lost half of its body mass,’ Solomon analyzed, gripping the shaft of his spear. ’It will definitely have a harder time maneuvering without the stabilizing weight of its tail. But now that its body is significantly shorter, it will be much harder to spot beneath the dunes, and its overall swimming speed might actually increase because of the reduced drag.’

Furthermore, the beast’s alien biology meant it didn’t bleed like a normal creature. The lack of a distinct blood trail made tracking it through the shifting sands nearly impossible. Leaving it alone wasn’t an option either since it wouldn’t die from blood loss.

"Maybe I should have chosen a heavy mace instead of a spear," Solomon muttered, pulling his weapon free from the severed tail. "But a mace’s reach is even shorter than a greatsword and lacks the ability to pierce, so perhaps that would have been a terrible idea."

He listened closely to the desert floor. Even the seismic rumbling had diminished significantly since the worm’s body mass had been cut in half. The subtle vibrations were easily masked by the ambient wind.

Solomon coated his fists and the tip of his spear in silver aura. Since he hadn’t yet unlocked his navel core, he still couldn’t channel his aura directly into his legs or feet. He needed a better vantage point to track the beast.

He sprinted toward the nearest sandstone mountain, planted the butt of his spear into the bedrock, and used the weapon to pole-vault high into the air.

He didn’t quite reach the summit, but his giant form allowed him to easily grab the ledges and climb the rest of the way up.

"I can’t believe I am struggling against one monster," he muttered with an annoyed look on his face as he climbed up.