Ajax P.O.V.

The dense forest stretching out all around us is completely unfamiliar, [Danger Sense] is constantly pulsing despite the fact that I haven’t moved from the spot right in front of the exit arch.

“I know this was briefly covered in the Academy but you haven’t yet faced a monster above level one hundred, take your time to inspect and analyze them.” the prince reminds me as I scan the trees surrounding us.

The academy did a deep dive on monsters but even then they mostly focused on monsters that can be found inside the kingdom or the lower floors of the dungeon. The main progression of a monster is the stages of growth, from infant to young, adolescent, adult and finally peak.

While the beating heart of a monster's power, its mana core, was covered in depth as it forms early on, monsters also have a level dependent evolution, the mana channels that connect the mana core to every inch of the body. This happens at level one hundred and comes with a massive jump in power. It is that jump in power that keeps almost all adventurers from making the push past level 100 inside the dungeon.

A few stomps and snapping branches behind me along with a much stronger pulse from [Danger Sense] lets me know that something is approaching quickly. I don’t waste the time to look behind me as I roll out of the way, I move quickly enough that I have time to really take in the stag that tried to gore me with its large antlers.

“It's level 107.” the prince tells me. “Should be good for a warm up. If you can’t take this on you won’t kill a mini boss.”

As I dash in with my shield held firm I bash the stag’s head away as I open a clean path for my axe to open up its throat. I can feel the mana pulsing through the stag's body, more than that because it's all happening internally [Mana Syphon] can’t touch any of it. The stag doesn’t just feel like seven levels higher it feel more like twenty seven levels higher.

My axe slashes down covered in wind magic to help cleave straight through and while it does manage to break through the fur and skin the wound isn’t as deep as I’d like it to be. The stag’s mana pulses much harder, I can see it gathering in its antlers.

During the fight the prince has already started his duty. My battle with stag must have drawn some outside attention since I can feel the prince’s mana being channeled as he dashes through the trees surrounding us. I can’t focus on that just yet, I need to first kill my opponent.

As soon as the mana starts to level the stag’s antlers [Mana Syphon] find a hold and I can feel my own mana reserve not being emptied so quickly. The attack is clearly wind mana, a massive wind blast is being sent towards me but my drain is clearly something the stag didn’t anticipate as it takes him far too long to channel the attack, by the time he launches it I am already moving out of the way.

Impressively enough the stag has the ability to dual cast. While charging up his wind attack he was also managing to keep me from binding his feet into the ground with my Earth magic. The stag isn’t all that skilled however as while I might not be able to cover his feet and I did manage to form a large hole under him by pushing three hundred mana into it.

Our second clash happens as the stag is trying to leap out of the hole, this time however I have a better idea about how to handle the exchange. I am clearly not the only one as a small puff of air is released right before the antlers make contact with my shield, killing a lot of my momentum and not forcing the stag to expose his neck.

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The defensive maneuver works perfectly as I have no opening to strike at its neck a second time, unfortunately for the stag that wasn’t my plan at all as I swing my hammer glowing with the eerie glow of Void mana. The hammer connects cleanly on the stags ribcage to the right of its mana core.

The split second longer it takes the void attack to travel from the point of impact is enough for the stag’s front leg to slam into my thigh breaking straight through my defensive enchantments and still hitting hard enough that I can feel my bones crack.

The battle however is over as soon as the void attack finishes its travel. I can see the bug eyed expression as the internal damage forces the stag to vomit a mouthful of blood and its previous study stance starts to lose its balance.

I’m not willing to let this chance go as I launch myself off my good leg and follow up with a second void strike to head. The stag tries its best to put up a defensive wind wall but with its mana core cracked the power and control over its own magic diminished greatly and with [Mana Syphon] still working away the spell can’t take form.

The battle ends with a gentle tap of my hammer and a brief look of confusion crosses the stag’s eye before blood gushes out of its eyeballs and nostrils as it falls to the ground, dead.

“That was harder than I expected.” I say to the prince who returned as I use my Light and Life spells to heal my leg, I’m sure I have a massive bruise where the hoof connected with my thigh. “I’ll need maybe two or three hours to recover but I’m confident in taking on a miniboss.”

“You did well.” the prince says as he examines the wounds on the stag. “Wind was a bad choice to use for your first attack, those mana channels let it answer your wind mana with its own so it did almost nothing.”

We spend the next twenty minutes waiting for me to finish healing my leg before we start moving and searching for my target. As we move through the forest I can see the monsters finally putting up some resistance against the prince. It isn’t anything impressive, all of them are killed with a single attack but they are at least able to perceive and try to react to him now before they are killed. One wolf even managed to dodge his initial attack as it channeled Earth mana and tried burrowing through the ground.

It takes only another hour before we find the miniboss we were looking for. A small pack of three wolves surrounds a large alpha that is guarding an arch to the next floor. “I’ll distract the three of them while you deal with the mini boss.” the prince offers.

As soon as I am in position the prince launches an attack at one of the wolves by throwing a dagger at it. As soon as the attack connects I follow up in the moment of distraction and launch an lightning infused arrow straight towards the alpha.

The distraction was enough for the three wolves to ignore me as the alpha yelped as the lightning surged through him. A pair of beady black eyes locked onto me, despite the obvious pained yelping I could see the anger and hate in its eyes.

Unlike the stag I don’t want to give the wolf any chance and draw a second arrow. This one is infused with magma. I can see the wolf tracking the projectile yet despite its best efforts it still can’t seem to move its body well enough because of the lightning coursing through it. The arrow doesn’t strike the head as I planned but it does take it in the shoulder releasing magma insides the wolf body.

The fight is almost over but the large amount of mana being channeled unsettles me as the wolf releases a howl and I brace myself by switching to my shield. I’m surprised to feel that nothing happened. In my confusion I lower my shield to take a look and see the wolf crouching on its back legs right before it leaps and disappears as it finally uses the mana it was channeling.

My [Danger Sense] screams at me as the wolf jumps from my own shadow going straight for my throat. This isn’t good, I can’t stop it, the best I can do is try to minimize the damage. I flood as much mana as I can into summoning an ice shield around my neck while also swinging both my hammer and shield looking to make sure I kill it after its attack lands.

None of that happens however as the wolf’s skull is shattered by a flying knee from the prince as he intercepts its ambush. “This is why I told you to be careful.” the prince chides me. “Until you get a sense for what mana type a monster favors don’t leave openings like not infusing your own shadow with mana.”

I have nothing to say to that, not that it would matter as the ice surrounding my throat wouldn’t let me open my mouth anyway. I got ahead of myself, the last few dungeons had been getting easier and easier as my stats kept increasing, I wasn’t expecting such a last ditch effort.

“Good reaction.” the prince says as he makes sure the alpha is dead while I remove the ice surrounding my throat. “Good chance you might have won that even if I didn’t interfere, but it was too close for me to chance it. How long do you need before we try again?”

“An hour for my mana to regenerate.” I answer as I take a potion to help me with my regeneration. I won’t mess up next time, I promise myself.