Zectas Volume III: Malediction of Veneficatl Valley by John Nest, Timaeus, Vaanouney, You The Reader Page B

special stone that can cure people?"

"This is a Matera Vitalis stone? I've heard about it, but I thought it was just a myth."

The Condortlian was surprised, and he thought about Smoke's question. It was logical and there was a high chance that this was indeed a special effect of the Matera Vitalis.

Smoke then told Adder what he had observed.

"Really? All I know is that it started growing from a green scaly arm, and later transformed into this brown crusted form."

"My arms were green? Did they start out like a small stump and then grew to be like this?"

"Yes, It did. How did you know that?"

Adder took a deep breath and suddenly began scratching out his brown crusted arm.

"Hey, hey, what are you doing. Stop that."

Smoke grabbed Adder's right hand and held on to it firmly.

"I'm taking this thing off of me."

"Why would you do that? Do you like living with just one arm?"

"It's better than living with one that belongs to a virile. I don't want a monster's arm."

"Wait a minute. Let's calm down a bit. Are you sure this is exactly the same process that the Lizard people went through?"

Adder stopped resisting and relaxed himself.

"Well, when their arms grew back they didn't turn into this brown scaly crust."

"There you go. See, I'm sure this isn't a monster's arm at all."

Despite what Smoke said, both of them didn't believe a word of it. The scaly green arm that grew, clearly belonged to a virile monster.

Smoke thought to change the subject.

"For now, why don't we focus on getting out of here. I already tried using Earth Manipulation but it didn't work. I'm thinking that we could climb up these walls. Do you think you could stand?"

Adder tried to stand up, but he felt dizzy and slumped back down. For the first time, Adder felt the brown crusted arm draining all of his energy. He thought about telling Smoke but decided not to because he didn't want to worry his leader.

"Sorry, I can't." replied Adder meekly.

"Don't worry about it. I'll just strap you on to my back." said Smoke. He then took out his wall climbing harness and strapped it on Adder's body. As he tried to lift his injured friend up, he noticed that he was heavier than he looked.

"You've gotten really heavy. Have you always weighed this much?" asked Smoke.

A confused Adder looked at Smoke, "I don't know what you mean? I feel normal, it's just that I don't have any energy to move."

Smoke had a hard time standing up because of Adder's added weight, but with the aid of his rare gloves he managed to get a firm grip on the wall.

With Adder safely secured, Smoke looked up the steep wall. He started to scale it, with his injured friend on his back. Yet, Adder's weight proved to be beyond the limits of his Claws of Chiropterra.

He could only reach up to the height of four feet before they got pulled down by gravity. He inspected his gloves to check their status.
     
    Claws of Chiropterra (Gloves)

  A rare glove that closely resembles the claws of the monstrous winged foxbat Chiropterra.

  Equipment Ability:
    * Foxbat Grip (Passive)
      + You can grip solid surfaces with ease,
        climbing mountains becomes a breeze.
    * Earth affinity + 15%

  Restriction Warning:
    - Can only carry up to 500 pounds in weight.
    Smoke was surprised to see the restriction section in the item because it did not display such an information before. He thought that the item must have only shown it now because his weight went beyond 500 pounds.

He was shocked to learn that Adder's weight must have been more than 300 pounds, since he was only 190 pounds himself.

"Alright, that's it. I don't think we could go out that way."

Adder felt responsible. He knew that it was his increased weight that was literally bringing them down.

"Sorry about that, Smoke. Why don't we rest for a few minutes? Who knows, maybe I'll recover then?"

"Sure, let's do that. I'll cook us some grub as well."

Smoke prepared a