New Earth- The Dungeon Of Madness 71 Sacred Ground

The 3 harpies slowly lowered their alt.i.tude as they activated [Wind Blade]. They would have preferred to stay out of reach near the ceiling but [Wind Blade] had a limited range. The further the blades traveled, the thinner they would become and the less damage they would deal. In order to contribute to the fight, they needed to get closer to the danger.

"Don't use too much mana! It is fine as long as the Death Knights are winning!" said Ariel. The harpies were not at a very high level and therefore, had a limited amount of Mana. They needed to be conservative in case something unexpected happened. Fortunately, they succeeded in learning some wind magic before this fight or else, they would need to physically attack the beasts.

With just the few wind blades, several Death Knights were freed from the beasts and joined their comrades into fighting the enemies. The beasts were strong but under the suppressing attacks of the harpies, they were forced into a defensive stance.

Meanwhile, Dreidus was taunting the Forest Tiger King, forcing it to focus his attention on him.

The Forest Tiger King strangely became thrilled at the idea of fighting a strong opponent. It had been a long time since he fought somebody strong. In the forest, he was the strongest when it came to physical abilities. He was suppressed by the Cobra King only because of its deadly poison and now that he had the opportunity to vent himself, he went all out on Dreidus.

[Wind Fury]

Wind gathered around his paws as the Forest Tiger King charged at Dreidus.

The latter immediately reacted and swung his blade but to his surprise, he slashed at nothing but air.

The Tiger King made a quick feint and instead of attacking his right side, it instead attacked the left one. With his extreme speed and agility, the movements were fluid and Dreidus could only clench his teeth as his side was clawed.

Dreidus tried to push the Forest Tiger away with his oval s.h.i.+eld but before he could touch the Forest Tiger King, it already moved and was already clawing Dreidus' back. The beast king was incredibly fast and continuously clawed and bit through Dreidus' armor.

Fortunately, his armor was thick and had good defensive stats but that did not stop Dreidus from being flung left and right by the Forest Tiger King.

"Roar!!"

The beast continuously attacked but no matter how hard he tried, he was unable to destroy that armor. Even his mighty saber teeth were unable to pierce through them but he did not give up. He was excited, he finally encountered an opponent who could resist all his attacks, but he did not lose track of his original goal in coming here.

The Forest Tiger King briefly looked at how the Ape King was doing and nodded approvingly. He then glanced at the pack of beasts as his expression turned dark.

"F*ck... Trying to keep me here as you slaughter all the other beasts! As if I can let that happen!"

Immediately, the Forest Tiger King let out a deafening roar that resonated throughout the entire plain. Moments later, the Ape King joined him and roared while loudly smas.h.i.+ng its fists on its chests.

Magically, as they heard the 2 kings shouting, all the beasts became excited and wildly started to attack the Death Knights again. The combined roar was the special ability of the 2 kings: [Call of the Wild]. It temporarily increased all the stats of all beast-type monsters that heard the call by 10 % and since 2 kings were using it at the same time, the stats increased by 20%.

On the side of the Ape King, the living corpse, Anken was already lying dead while Krishaw was already covered with bruises. Lyra did not suffer from any attacks and even managed to take out 30% of the Ape King's HP but clearly, they were at a disadvantage.

The Ape King used its skill, [Crus.h.i.+ng Boulder Fist] to smash Anken into a meatball. With every attack, the sound of bones cracking would be heard until finally, Anken's HP reached zero. While he was attacking, the Ape King ignored Krishaw who was constantly swinging his ax at him. The Ape King's fur was extremely resistant and although he felt pain, it was not unbearable.

Lyra was sending psychic attacks but unfortunately, her [Wails of Sorrow] would not work on the Ape King; it was only effective on advanced races like the humans; against a beast, it would be useless.

...

In the meanwhile, Five already left the common room as soon as the fight started. He was making his way up the stairs towards the gra.s.sy plain when heard a familiar "Bzzz"

"Lumen? What is it?" asked Five. It had been a long time since he had spoken to the Firefly Queen. She usually spent a lot of time with the harpies and slept with them. Lumen particularly liked to stay with the quiet Angela as Five would often see her on the silver-haired harpy's shoulder.

"Bzzz Bzzz!"

"You want to fight too? Don't worry! The fireflies already contribute a lot to the dungeon! Leave this battle to the others!" answered Five.

The Firefly Queen landed on his shoulder while buzzing as if saying that she would protect him in case of danger. Five smiled before continuing to climb the stairs.

Soon, the gra.s.sy plains came into view and Five's expression immediately darkened. He could see that the situation wasn't in his favor. The Death Knights were being mercilessly stomped to the ground even as the harpies were helping them. Further away, Dreidus was being constantly attacked from all sides without being able to retaliate.

Five watched as Dreidus used [Rise of the Dead], only to see the 3 skeletons being smashed into piles of bones in less than 3 seconds.

On the other side, Five could see the last living corpse desperately hacking at the Ape King who squished its body before throwing it on the ground. Lyra was still floating high above the ground as she fired dazzling white b.a.l.l.s at the Ape King. Even as these b.a.l.l.s exploded on the Beast King's fur, it did not seem to cause a lot of damage.

Above their head, Five could see their HP bar, the Ape King still had 50% HP while the Forest Tiger King was at 80% but his 2 boss monsters were in a bad position!

"As expected... This trial is really hard... Did I cross the border and enter a red zone?" thought Five. "Anyway... I can think about this later!"

He quickly cleared his mind as he started chanting. He was casting the skill he acquired just moments ago and although it was just his first time, his words were fluid and quickly, a strange symbol appeared in front of him.

[Aura of Light: Sacred Ground]

A bright light invisible to anyone other than Five suddenly spread through the gra.s.s plain. He watched as the glowing light surrounded all his monsters while ignoring the beasts. The monsters could not see what was happening but at that moment, they all felt the same thing; they felt their strength surging as their fatigue wore off.

The skill picked by Five belonged to the Knight of Light's cla.s.s. After recalling how at Kroff's dungeon, the Colonel Gaydon could use his skills to influence the whole fight, he was inspired to learn buffing skills. He was currently weak and could not join the fight but if he could increase the strength of his monsters, he would be able to contribute in his own way.

[Aura of Light: Sacred Ground] was a level 45 skill that blessed a certain location, increasing all the stats of allies by 10%. The buff was mediocre for a skill of that level but the reason for that was because instead of targeting a single person, this skill could buff an entire army. The zone it covered was ma.s.sive and this was precisely why Five chose it.

With just this skill, all his monsters on the gra.s.sy plain were buffed!

The monsters instinctively knew that this new strength was coming from their master; they could not let him down now! All the Death Knights aggressively fought back and with the help of the harpies, they once again got the upper hand.

The 2 Beast Kings immediately felt the change, they knew that the dungeon master had come. The Forest Tiger King was still mercilessly striking Dreidus. Despite the buff, Dreidus was still unable to hold the tiger down, he kept taking damage and even with the heavy armor, his HP was already down to 50%.

"Oh... There he is..." murmured the Forest Tiger King as his eyes focused towards the very end of the gra.s.sy plain. There was quite a distance, but the Forest Tiger King was clearly able to see a small figure standing out.

"Looks like playtime is over... If we stay there for too long, we'll without a doubt lose..." murmured the Forest Tiger King. He roared before suddenly jumping to the side.

Dreidus was intently focusing on the Forest Tiger King. He was being completely suppressed but he still gave it his all. After so many exchanges, he was getting better at tracking the beast king when suddenly, he saw the abnormal behavior of the Forest Tiger King.

For a few seconds, while constantly attacking, the Forest Tiger King looked lost, as if he was looking for something until his expression changed. Dreidus followed his line of sight and immediately knew what the Forest Tiger King saw.

Dreidus knew the floor by heart and knew that the Forest Tiger King was looking at the stairs leading to the 5th floor. Adding that with the sudden increase in power he felt, Dreidus did not need to turn around to know that Five was standing near the stairs.

Suddenly, he saw the Forest Tiger King jump to the side. Dreidus tensed up, it was clear that the Forest Tiger wanted to break away from him to charge at Five! He could not let him succeed! Dreidus immediately jumped to the side to block the path towards Five but to his surprise, the Forest Tiger King never planned to aim for Five.

Unfortunately, it was too late to react! Dreidus could only watch as he screamed, "Lyra!! Careful!"

He stared in horror as the Forest Tiger King leaped behind Lyra before viciously lacerating her back while piercing her throat with his saber teeth.