Ryan licked the blood off of his fingers and dove down again, both his legs clinging tightly to the shaking tree. He then started clawing at the boars in a frenzy, landing hits on whatever he could get his hands on. Now that this bloody fight had turned into a damned race against time, he needed to injure the bastards before they took down the tree. Sure, they had numbers but he also had infinite stamina! Let's see who goes down first!

Ryan began madly swinging his arms. He did not care about which boar he was attacking and simply clawed left and right. Seconds ticked by as blood splattered everywhere and the screeching sounds of the boars filled the air. Several of the boars were now heavily bleeding. However, they kept charging the tree in a frenzy and Ryan also kept attacking. A couple of minutes later, he was literally hanging upside down from the tree branch and attacking the beasts wildly.

Thanks to his hard efforts, the first one finally fell and the sweet notification of experience points rang loudly in Ryan's ears. "Yes!" He was pumped up and began clawing even faster when suddenly a new beast arrived at this party without his invitation.

[Elite Wild Boar; Level 8]

And behind this beast, two more as well appeared.

[Elite Wild Boar; Level 7]

[Elite Wild Boar; Level 8]

Now there were three elite-rank beasts in addition to the rowdy herd. Things were not looking good. "You have got to be kidding me." Ryan stared in shock as his hands still continued clawing away like there was no tomorrow. But he had a very bad premonition.

One hit from this boar was probably going to end the tree and make him come tumbling down. Now he was definitely a goner! To add to his misery, it looked like not just one but all three of the boars were preparing to charge together at the already battered tree trunk.

Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!

Ryan kept clawing away as he gulped at this worst-case scenario. Murphy's law was really working very hard against him. The three boars let out a synchronized roar and charged towards the tree. Ryan winced, still clawing madly. He only managed to land one attack on the elite boar when the fateful collision took place.

BAM! Everything shook. The tree cracked into two and the person atop it was coming down hard. Ryan landed on the ground with a thud, receiving numerous scratches from the tree branches.

-10

The many wild boars all glared at him with reddened eyes and unbridled fury as he had injured almost all of them except for the elite ones. Yup, this was going to be a stampede, a massacre. As a last lame attempt, Ryan swung his hand again, using the same [Claw] skill, when he suddenly received another notification.

[Claw- Lvl.4 → Claw- Lvl.5]

[Blood Swipe: Cost- 2 skill points; When an enemy is clawed, use blood essence to deal extra damage; Use the blood of the enemies to deal 130% of attack power; Use your blood to deal 200% of attack power; Cool Down: None]

Ryan stared blankly at the unexpected notification which had popped out of nowhere. He then broke into a huge grin. Of course, the skill had leveled up. He was clawing like there was no tomorrow for several minutes now. It would only be weird if it did not level up!

The real surprise was that he had actually received a skill related to blood! This was what he had been waiting for all this time and now he was ready to go! "Purchase!" He shouted without any hesitation and instantly used the skill on the boars that were barely an inch away from tearing him apart.

-120

-120

-120

He clawed three times at the boar closest to him and immediately three big damage numbers popped out! The fight that would have taken him at least eight or nine attacks just like that came to an end with the boar screeching loudly and falling down dead.

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"Fuck! I finally have an actual skill to use!" Ryan grinned as he continued spamming the new skill in all different directions. He was at the moment completely surrounded by wild boars, but he did not care. He was invigorated by the new and upgraded skill after struggling so long with the basic version.

"Come on. Level up for me again." Ryan emptied his mind as he completely immersed himself in the battle. One after the other, he swiped, punched, blocked, and kicked the boars, experience points continuing to accumulate. Soon he also received the next notification.

"Sweet! Add 2 to strength, 2 to agility, and 1 to defense." Ryan used the same distribution and continued to tango with the boars. The new attribute boost definitely increased the damage so it made him even faster. However, in a few seconds, this situation completely changed. Ryan stood face-to-face with one of the elite boars who charged at him from the left. This beast was bigger than the rest of the boars, chunkier and sturdier.

When he attacked it before, he was not able to get across its thick hide. So Ryan immediately used blood swipe on the elite without any hesitation. His normal attacks were not going to work here.

-40

"Tch. Not good enough." Of course, this was the damage when he used the boar's blood. There was still the option to use his own blood. This was as good a time as any to try it out so Ryan quickly cut his palm and used the skill again. He felt a stinging sensation as blood leaked out of the wound but definitely, the boar felt more pain as it let out an enraged roar.

-100

"Now this I can work with." Without wasting any precious drops of his blood, he repeatedly spammed the skill again. He had to think about the skill and also perform the clawing action to activate it. So he did not have much time to think about anything else. While the elite boar attacked him, the other boars also continued to attack him without giving him any space.

Also, the elite's every single attack packed a punch. One hit and he would probably be dead. This was clear when he side-stepped to miss the attack and the elite charged onto another boar, instantly killing the poor beast.

Ryan smiled bitterly as he made a mental note to never get hit by the big ones and continued with the long and drawn-out fight. With several boars charging at him from multiple sides, the only thing that worked to his advantage was the poor intelligence these beasts had.

Despite their initial strategic approach, it turned out that they were dumb after all. The ones at the back sometimes pushed the ones at the front which them to lose their balance and made it easier for Ryan to attack the fumbling boar. Also, the elites were charging like mad rampaging beasts, taking out some of the boars by themselves.

Slowly, little by little, the herd eventually thinned down and one of the elites also fell. Ryan was left facing off two elites at the end with his level bumped up two more times, reaching Level 8. The elites were also of the same level so the fight was easier than before.

A couple more minutes of dodging and blood swipes later, he was finally done with the entire herd and slumped onto the last elite, his teeth sinking into its injured skin and his health as well quickly regenerated.

As the elite boar's body dispersed into light dust, Ryan fell back and sat down, not bothered by the blood stains and the aftermath of the battle which still lingered. For the first time, he felt tired. He was not physically tired and panting and his stamina was also intact but still, he felt extremely worn out.

"Is this some sort of brain fatigue?"

He was constantly fighting for almost half an hour or maybe more in a high-stress situation so he assumed that this was probably the case. Although he wanted to stay here and relax for a while, he had not forgotten about the main reason why he had gotten into the whole mess in the first place.

Ryan's gaze turned cold as he thought about that priest and paladin duo. They had in fact helped him more than they had harmed him but that didn't mean he was going to forget them. He needed to figure out this curse first but after that… He stood up even though he was tired and began moving slowly to another location. The two might decide to come back here for him so he did not want to stay here for long.

Back at the graveyard…

"What is taking him so long? Do you think he really died?" Sara tapped her fingers on her elbow, feeling a little unease creeping into her heart. Something was amiss somewhere. Her gut feeling told her. She just knew it. "Could he have maybe escaped? Somehow?"

Martin, on the other hand, seemed rather quite confident. "Nah. Impossible." He brushed away her concerns with a casual wave of his hand. As a Level 30 paladin, even he was not confident enough to handle a herd of boars of that size. How could a small fry like that guy survive something like that?

"He probably died a bunch of times before we got here, so maybe his respawn time is longer."

"Ya. You are right." Sara also nodded, though she still seemed unsure. Her friend's words hadn't yet totally convinced her. The two continued to stare at the empty graveyard as they waited for some more time. Though it was a waste of time, they couldn't bring themselves to give up on the endeavor after already having spent so much time on it.

Only the sweet, sweet face slap was left now, and they were not willing to forego it without seeing the humiliation and suffering on the other party's face.