Instead of trying to lumber forward to swing his axe at the Rat King's body, Hugh swung his axe over his head and slammed it into the ground with the blunt side of the head first.
The axe struck the ground with enough force to send a tiny earthquake over to the Rat King, destabilizing it and disrupting its concentration. Although it wasn't enough to dispel the meteor, it forced the Rat King to choose between using its mana to continue attacking or repairing the ground it stood on.
Hugh hadn't seen the Rat King when it crossed the wasteland and how it skillfully repaired any cracks and fractures wherever it walked. But it was obvious that the Scorched Earth Rat King could wield the earth attribute with proficiency, and it would be better to assume the Rat King wouldn't be stopped by something so simple as uneven ground.
Nevertheless, the Rat King stumbled and hesitated about what to do. Hugh took advantage of the gap in the Rat King's guard and lunged forward, using the incredible strength in his legs to cross the distance as quickly as possible. Usually, even that speed wouldn't have been enough to take the Rat King by surprise and launch an attack. But since the Rat King was hesitatingly holding on to the meteor in the sky, instead of regaining its balance and focusing on Hugh, the Rat King was simply too busy to react to Hugh's attack.
Hugh landed with his right foot in front, and using the momentum of his lunge, he turned his body clockwise, swinging his ax like he wanted to fell a tree in a single strike. The tree-like texture on his body made cracking sounds as he twisted his torso with enough force to almost stir up a whirlwind.
The axe let out a whistling sound as it headed straight for the Rat King's bent right foreleg, the same limb that had attacked Hugh just moments before.
The Rat King sensed danger and let go of the mana it used to create the meteor and instead focused on defending itself by reinforcing the leg that Hugh was about to strike. Although the Rat King reacted quickly, it only managed to send some mana into the leg to reinforce it.
And Hugh's axe struck true, as the Rat King's leg was cleanly severed.
After the leg was chopped right below the elbow, the world seemed to have paused for both the Rat King and Hugh due to the shock.
Hugh was surprised at how easy it had been to cut off the Rat King's limb. Despite using his full strength, he expected that he would at most break the bone and force the Rat King to limp around a bit but had instead completely taken everything below the elbow clean off.
The Rat King was surprised due to a similar reason, but mainly because its innated superiority complex wouldn't let it believe a supposedly inferior creature had managed to injure it to such an extent.
The pause only lasted for a brief moment. Hugh was experienced enough to know he couldn't let this opportunity go to waste, and the Rat King had instincts to rival that experience. Continuing to revel in surprise would only let the other party gain the advantage in the next exchange.
Hugh knew he wouldn't get another chance like this.
Since the leg was still on the ground, he wanted to get rid of it before the Rat King could reattach it and recover, but with the leg's size, it wasn't viable, and the only thing he could do was distract the Rat King from picking up the leg. Although Hugh wasn't even sure if the Rat King could actually do something like that, preparing for the worst possible sequence of events tended to save more lives, and he had made similar mistakes several times when he just started out as an explorer. Mistakes he was forced to suffer the consequences for making.
So instead of trying to get rid of the severed leg, Hugh attacked the other. But this time, the Rat King was prepared and moved the leg away before Hugh's strike could land.
The Rat King jumped back a couple of paces to distance itself from Hugh, but that's not all it did. The severed leg started burning before it quickly turned into white smoke that was sucked in by the Rat King.
After the Rat King absorbed the white smoke, the bleeding stump that was what remained of its leg started wriggling. The bleeding stopped, and new flesh and bones sprouted out of the wound, quickly turning into a new leg and foot.
The damage Hugh had managed to inflict on the Rat King had been nullified just like that, and after the Rat King's previous mistake, he almost definitely wouldn't get another chance to counterattack.
Thankfully he hadn't moved too far away from the forest and could still rely on its continued support to endure the attacks that the Rat King would throw at him now that Hugh had successfully managed to enrage the viciously calm Rat King.
The Rat King would no longer try to conserve its energy as it attacked. Instead, it would prioritize venting its rage on the vile creature that had actually injured it and forced it to expend a serious amount of mana to heal itself.
The Rat King's eyes burned as it jumped on Hugh, unleashing a flurry of strikes with its paws, focused on tearing him to shreds with its claws.
Hugh tried to block as much of the damage as possible with his axe, but it didn't take long for him to lose the grip on it as it was flung far away to the side. While he could bring it back to his hands thanks to his inclination, the axe wouldn't help him with the situation he was in. Instead of foolishly trying to deflect the claw strikes from the Rat King, Hugh curled up into a ball on the ground, doing his best to strengthen the transformation and endure the pain of having the claws rip and tear away at his now bark-like skin.
