When they descended from the fortress and entered the schoolyard, Liam had to admit the difficulty caused by the flood, as his feet sank quite deep, making movement harder.
However, with Melly's control over the water, she suddenly pushed away the water around them, creating an open area so they didn't have to step in the water anymore.
"Does this consume a lot of your Mana?" Liam asked her.
Melly shook her head in response. "If I control water that doesn't originate from me, it doesn't take much Mana."
Hearing her words, Liam nodded.
If it consumed too much Mana, he would've forbidden her from doing this since running out of Mana in battle would be dangerous.
Liam glanced at his watch, seeing that it was almost 7 AM, but the sky was still quite dark.
He suspected that if the rain didn't stop, even at noon, the sky would remain like this.
As they stepped out of the fortress's defense zone, Liam saw the zombies and giant frogs start staring at them.
He checked their levels, but the highest was only Level 3.
Splash! Splash! Splash!
The zombies only stared at them briefly before quickly running across the water toward them, while the giant frogs leapt high and far, landing directly above them.
Liam calmly glanced at them, but Lisa and Melly tensed up. Even Alex became very alert, gripping his large sword tightly.
However, before the frogs could land, Alice, wearing her blue dress, suddenly leaped from the top of the fortress toward them, her red claws extending.
Her movement was so fast that even Liam squinted his eyes, realizing she had reached Level 5.
He couldn't predict how zombies and monsters leveled up. Even without fighting, they somehow managed to increase their levels.
Alice slashed at the frogs, leaving claw marks on their bodies, but didn't kill them right away as she moved forward to attack the horde of zombies, either killing or throwing them.
Even though she relied only on her claws, her agility made it difficult for people to even see what she was doing.
"You fight on your own," Liam told Lisa and Melly.
After saying that, he jumped toward the horde of zombies ahead, leaving the giant frogs for them.
Despite their large size, their bodies were clearly vulnerable, making it easier for beginner fighters like the two women to attack and injure them.
Naturally, Liam couldn't keep helping them all the time.
He also wanted to fight to strengthen himself.
Even though no zombie or monster had granted him Battle Points yet, he believed they would come once he caused enough chaos by slaughtering many zombies and monsters.
His hand transformed, but this time into a dragon hand with blue scales — the Water Dragon Hand.
With so much water around, naturally, he needed water power, which he believed would greatly help him.
As his hand became the Water Dragon Hand, he instantly felt a connection to the water.
Controlling it like Melly? That was far too easy for him.
Buzz!
He spun the water where the zombie horde was, forming it into something like a storm, but more destructive — more like water spinning inside a blender.
The speed of the spinning water easily shredded the zombies.
People who were used to seeing him wield fire with his Fire Dragon Hand or Phoenix Wings could only gape as they watched him control water so terrifyingly.
BANG!
When he struck the air in front of him, the floodwater ahead split for fifty meters, creating a path for him to walk through.
This effect wasn't caused by shockwaves but purely by his control over the water.
Speaking of controlling water, Liam doubted anyone could be better at it than a Water Dragon.
"Eh..."
From a distance, he suddenly noticed movement beneath the water. It was fast, like a swimming fish — but it wasn't a fish. It was something elongated.
It didn't take long before it reached his side — a frog tongue, bright red like rubber but moving with perfect precision.
Naturally, it tried to wrap around his legs, but before it could, he stabbed it with his sword.
Xiu!
His sword easily pierced through the tongue and pinned it into the ground.
Liam then grabbed the tongue with his dragon hand since his palm alone wasn't enough to grasp it.
He lifted it, discovering it originated from the school swimming pool at the far edge of the courtyard about fifty meters away.
Shua!
He began pulling on the tongue to draw out its owner.
Instantly, its owner, hidden inside the swimming pool, was lifted into the air — a frog even larger than the others, nearly twice as tall as a human.
It was also slightly different from the other frogs, with golden stripes on its green body, as if announcing that it wasn't an ordinary frog.
(Monster Level 5!)
Liam received the notification.
Though being pulled into the air, the frog stayed surprisingly stable. Its mouth opened wide, firing a water ball toward Liam.
It was fast. As Liam let go of the tongue and raised his hand to control the water ball, it suddenly exploded, releasing a powerful shockwave that splashed out the water droplets.
But it wasn't ordinary water. It was hot. As it hit the floodwater, the water instantly began to boil.
Liam believed that these splashes could instantly blister human skin, and now most of the splashes were raining down on him.
Surprisingly, when he tried to control the splashes, he failed.
They seemed to be not water, only very similar to water.
He quickly controlled the surrounding water to form a thick wall of water above him.
However, he soon realized that the splashes easily penetrated the water wall.
They evaporated the water wall effortlessly without diminishing themselves in the slightest.
Liam became aware that they couldn't be blocked by any liquid.
This frog's power could not be underestimated. However, based on his observation, only this particular frog had such boiling water ability.
The water balls fired by the other frogs didn't create these strange hot splashes.
Fortunately, Liam had a shield.
He quickly brought it out to protect himself.
The splashes hit the shield and flowed down, not hot enough to affect him.
But then Liam noticed a problem.
The shield had a small hole from Alice's claw marks. One splash entered through that hole.
He quickly caught the splash with his dragon hand.
Buzz!
Steam rose from his dragon hand as the splash fell on it, but Liam didn't feel any pain. However, one scale on his hand slightly loosened from the impact.
Even his extremely tough dragon hand sustained slight damage from a single drop — how much worse would it be for his actual body?
At this point, Liam dared not underestimate this frog anymore.
As he stared at it, the frog fired another water ball.
I guess I need to transform my hand again, Liam thought.
He hadn't expected a mere Level 5 monster could give him this much trouble with its unique ability.