With the release of a total of nine water jets, all the Morningstar Mushrooms cannot be used temporarily until they accumulate mana again.
Wyden and his tribesmen are forced to face the remaining lizardmen.
The high-level lizardman was clearly angered by the death of one of them. He didn't expect that these seemingly weak nymphs would be able to take down one of them.
In anger, the lizardman stomped his feet on the ground, and the earth seemed to provide energy and sustenance to him.
A thin layer of yellowish brown energy coated his body before he launched himself at Wyden.
The lizardman's speed was clearly faster than before, and even his strength grew. Wyden barely managed to block the spear with his wooden pole.
Even though his wooden pole was enhanced by his innate magic, cracks still started to appear on it.
The spear of the lizardman seems to generate vibration attacks that are not only damaging Wyden's weapon constantly, even his flesh and bones started to hurt.
He knew that he could not let this go on. If the stalemate of their weapons continues, Wyden's wooden pole would break, as well as his flesh and bones.
Wyden tried to put some distance between himself and the lizardman, but it was not easy. He was constantly being beaten, and the wounds he sustained grew more and more.
Even Lino and Ygro were the same. The female lizardman supported the other male lizardmen against the two of them.
With one long-range attacker and one close-range attacker, the synergy between the lizardmen was high.
Now that Larrak was focusing on the two nymphs rather than three nymphs, the superiority of long-range attacks was fully displayed.
Although Larrak cannot use the [Water Serpent] again due to the enormous mana cost, she can still provide support by launching magic missiles from time to time.
With the fact that the nymphs cannot use their weapons to block and can only dodge made things harder for them.
If that wasn't enough, ten whole minutes passed, and the blood-boil state of the nymphs ended. They unconsciously turned to look at each other, and they gritted their teeth.
It seems like they have to use their own mana and vitality to enter the blood boil state again.
However, just as they braced themselves to enter the blood boil state again despite the consequences, several sharp wooden sticks suddenly flew in the air.
The lizardmen didn't expect that a new wave of enemies would appear, and they were caught off guard. All three of them were hit by the sticks, and although they were not badly injured, the wound was not what was hard to endure.
A sense of sleepiness engulfed the lizardmen, but they still managed to shake that off. However, the rash that grew on their skin and the sense of paralysis they started suffering from were not the same.
The two close-range lizardmen were faring better. Their innate magic made it so that they were less susceptible to negative effects, and their resistance was higher.
However, the female lizardman was different. She started scratching the rashes growing on her green skin, but the more frantic she moved, the stronger the paralysis poison affected her system.
It was to the point that she could not stand on her legs anymore, her buttocks landing on the ground. She could only barely use her fingers to scratch the rashes.
At this moment, she was clearly not able to continue fighting anymore.
From the trees, Rezar and two more nymphs appeared. With his signal, a nymph threw a pouch at the high-level Transcendent lizardman.
Wyden, knowing what the pouch was for, moved away, letting the pouch hit the lizardman.
Since this lizardman can still move, it snorted in disdain before using its spear to slash at the pouch, which was a wrong decision.
As soon as a hole appeared in the pouch, the green powder it contained spilled out, even directly falling straight to the lizardman, who unconsciously took a whiff.
"Cough! Cough!"
As soon as the lizardman inhaled the green powder, it immediately felt like its lungs were on fire.
Compared to the poison that Rezar uses in his wooden sticks, the one in the pouch has a different effect. While it cannot affect anyone if the powder landed on the target's wound, as long as a bit of it was inhaled, anyone would suffer even more.
The poor target will feel like their throat and lungs were set on fire. The potency was even stronger compared to the poison in the wooden sticks.
It easily made even a high-level Transcendent powerless.
This was all thanks to Rezar's research! Behind the scenes, without any other nymphs knowing, he used wild beasts he caught as test subjects for the plants and herbs he found in the forest to determine their effects.
Even if nymphs knew what to eat or not to eat, at the end of the day, their knowledge of poison is still limited, considering that they do not like to use such things.
Rezar can only rely on his own effort, and this was a fruit of his research; an early-level Transcendent causing a high-level Transcendent to be powerless.
With two enemies subjugated, the remaining lizardman was even easier to defeat, and only then did Wyden and the others heave a sigh of relief.
However, before they can rest, Rezar's words unsettled them.
"Help me bind these lizardmen."
Wyden and the two nymphs looked at each other before the former spoke. "What for?"
In their minds, these lizardmen should just be killed. While the nymphs are kind and they prefer not to fight and kill, it doesn't mean that they can't.
Since these lizardmen are suspected to be the same ones that attacked Sheino and also to prevent the nymphs' tribe from being discovered by the lizardmen, the only option they have is to directly kill them.
Since that is the case, why do they need to bind these lizardmen?
"This is the Guardian Totem's orders. After you used the water-attribute mushrooms, we are tasked to check your situation and help. If there are enemies and we have subdued them, I am ordered to interrogate them. We need information about the enemies, we might even be able to learn their skills" Rezar answered, and Wyden and the others became even more unsettled.
The term used was 'interrogate,' but was it really as simple as Rezar asking questions to the lizardmen? Definitely not!
These lizardmen wouldn't speak easily unless they are…
Just thinking about what will happen in the interrogation made the nymphs uncomfortable. Even the two nymphs behind Rezar, who are more open-minded compared to other nymphs, were also uncomfortable.
However, seeing the effects of the weapons Rezar made caused them to hesitate to say anything.
They had seen how badly injured Wyden and the others were. If they suffer from such enemies, yet Rezar easily subdued them, granted it was with the use of sneak attacks and the lizardmen might have spent a lot of energy, but his accomplishments are still high.
Sometimes, people can only see results.
Rezar's success made the two open-minded nymphs think that maybe using poison and sneak attacks aren't that bad.
If they didn't do such a thing, even with their help, they might not be able to successfully save Wyden, Lino, and Ygro.
Little by little, Rezar's performance will affect the tribe since these two open-minded nymphs will definitely discuss it again in the future.
If other nymphs were to overhear their conversation and ask what happened, then perhaps they would also be influenced.
If even their Chief, the strongest in the tribe, is helpless against enemies, but Rezar, a much weaker nymph than him, subdued the enemies using poison, then maybe using it is for the better?
"You… are you planning on torturing them?" Wyden asked carefully while looking at the lizardmen with a complicated look on his face.
While he does not have goodwill towards these lizardmen, at the very least, he wanted to give them a quick end rather than letting Rezar handle them.
If it were Rezar who handles these lizardmen, they definitely would not have a good ending.
"If I need to, then I will" Rezar calmly answered. He had already steeled himself to do the dirty deeds for the tribe.
While he had not tortured anyone before, he was willing to do that for the sake of the Morningstar Tribe.
"This… c-can't we just kill them? No need to put them in such pain" Wyden asked with a frown, and the two nymphs with him nodded their heads, agreeing with his words.
Even the nymphs with Rezar were silently looking at him, hoping that he would change his mind.
Unfortunately, Rezar shook his head. "We don't even know where their tribe is; it is hard to defend against enemies when we don't even know where they are coming from."
"If we learn where these lizardmen's tribe is located, we can make sure no nymphs will get close and get hurt."