Kent's eyes lingered over those three words ‘Start Class up’. He could almost feel like there was going to be an extra title involved should he manage to kill that monster, but was that risk really worth getting killed over was another question. It was a decision he struggled with for quite some time.

Would a class offer him a more immediate benefit it would make sense to go for the evolution, but he had hunted most if not all the monsters besides the boss so he couldn’t gain further levels anyway? Even if he hadn’t there wouldn’t have been enough experience to gain another level had he taken the class right then and there.

The extra specializations didn’t offer a huge benefit either, since he would probably not get another skill point for the next ten levels an increased skill rank cap only helped had you reached your maximum and he was far away from that with all his skills.

It was decided, that he would wait until after the boss fight. Maybe even until after leaving the dungeon. He would take it as soon as there was a real chance at fighting monsters that gave him plenty of experience again.

With that decided, and his pools – except for stamina – completely regenerated he followed his most recent footprints along the crystal-clear water of the pond to the opposite side of the entrance. Each time his sight glanced over the water’s surface he was disturbed by the conformity of the shore area. There were no reeds growing, and nothing else to disrupt the circular shape of the pond. It was odd.

Keeping a wary eye on the surface just like last time he moved towards the region where he had last spotted the boss. In previous battles, he had determined that fighting the monsters of the dungeon was easier when they had to enter the water to get to him. It made sense, the short stubby legs of the tree dwellers weren’t made to keep them over the surface and didn’t offer a lot of propulsion. Stats in the low levels could only help so much, and turrls were lacking in the physical department thereof.

When he reached the opposite side, his steps grew more cautious. Due to his tentative combat plan, he hadn’t approached from the edge of the dungeon this time. This led to the distinct disadvantage of not being completely aware of where the Spreader was located. Charging into the boss area wouldn’t be smart either. The solidified venom had affected him once before and he would rather for the very same situation again.

Spreader, not turrl.

Oh no, that’s right. It’s a spreader, not a normal turrl. How do I know that the water tactic is going to work? He thought about his options more and decided that he would still adhere to most of his combat plan but forgo the water.

He decided it would be the best option to imitate the monsters he was fighting. Not for the fight of course, but to spot the turrl. Climbing into the trees would offer him a better vantage and hopefully not expose him to the tripwires the monster was spreading all throughout the trees. He found it doubtful for the boss to be able to get up in the trees in the first place.

As things stood though he couldn’t completely imitate the turrls movement through trees. His reach was too short, his weight too heavy for the thin branches, and his magic too low to traverse through the dense canopy of the dungeon forest. With time though, that would change, not his weight but his mana pool and regeneration. He was looking forward to a time when he could approximate flight – something he had theorized should be possible – though he would need a bunch of corresponding metal contraptions strapped to his body. It was an interesting thought, and maybe he wouldn’t even need the contraptions, seeing how his body showed up to Metallic Presence detection.

Contrary to his expectations though, observing his surroundings from the treetops helped little with scouting. The leaves obstructed too much of his periphery and made looking into the distance, even the not-so-distant floor impossible. His close surroundings in contrast were observable to a great degree.

As he moved further towards where he estimated the boss to be he climbed trees frequently to look out for other monsters but found none. He kept swinging a longer branch up and down in front of him to disturb potential traps which worked well given by the dozen or so strands of saliva in the leaves of the branch.

The first indicators of getting closer to the final monster were the increasing frequency of such strands. He found increasingly many disturbed ground areas that almost seemed to have been excavated at one point. A while later he heard scraping.

He had found the boss.

Kent had honestly tried to come up with a battle plan, but he couldn’t think of anything besides just using his mana to impale the monster until it hopefully died. The size was an issue, as it would require him to hit the monster in vital areas, otherwise, the homemade shivs probably wouldn’t do much.

At this point, he was painfully aware of how helpful proper equipment would be. A dozen knives or even a crafting skill would go a long way.

He had marked the track back to the lake, the three-hundred or so stride with the occasional large score in the ground but he doubted that he would get lost on the way, as he only had to run straight.

Lacking other tools, he would have preferred to wait, but acquiring new weapons was basically impossible. A spear or sword would have gone a long way, so would have a spell that did specific amounts of damage. Lacking any actual knowledge on how dagger damage was calculated he had to hope that all would work out well.

He readied himself by pulling more than half of his shivs – some in decent, others in barely acceptable condition – out of his knapsack and plugging them into his belt. Faster access would be worth the minor risk of injuring himself. Having a pouch for potions would be ideal, but he would have to make do with the one he had. Another two were strategically placed along his route of retreat, one at the lake and the last one in the cave. That was all he had left.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

With his common kitchen knife and the uncommon dagger in his two sheaths he readied himself.

Both hands held a shiv each, an arm length away from him, extending the line between his eyes and the monster, with their tips pointing directly at the boss. It was the best tactic he had discovered yet. And he was infinitely grateful for the bonus Mosquito had given him in this regard. Other metal objects sadly could only be accelerated away from his naval region, daggers the only exception.

He took a deep breath, preparing himself for the mental stress he was about to experience. Controlling more than one piece of metal was possible, it was just harder to concentrate on the image of both being accelerated separately.

The skills ramp-up was agonizingly slow and even now, after several dozens of kills with this method he still didn’t trust it.

For the first second the knives barely moved. At rank four and with his magic the skill moved the metal only a little more than fifteen paces away, the next second the total distance quadrupled. In the third it hit turrl in its side. Both pieces of metal completely vanishing inside the monster's hide.

He gulped before running away several dozen paces. He’d feared that. There was no visible damage yet the monster had reacted and noticed him.

Due to the relative position of his hands, he hadn’t been able to hit the monster accurately and had focused one hand on the head, the other the torso. Both were a hit – one had seemingly impacted into the neck the other vanishing inside the monster's torso. It let out a few squeaks, way too high pitched to fit a monster of that size, and began charging at a Kent that began accelerating another pair of daggers towards the boss.

Taking care to not lose his footing, evade trees ahead of him, and hitting the monster with his magic put a large strain on Kent’s mind, enough that he decided to try and get some points of mind per level out of his upcoming class.

He reached the lake after having loosened all of his handy shivs and even having pulled out a few of his backpacks when he determined his current path was with too few obstacles to cause significant dangers of tripping. With all the shivs gone, he began using the less crude knives, but they barely managed to damage barely. That wasn’t strictly due to the relative weakness of the knives though, but rather the shortened distance between the monster and Kent. The projectiles flew for less than two seconds now, greatly reducing their overall effectiveness.

This too wasn’t entirely unexpected, Kent had hoped he would at least incapacitate the monsters to a lesser extent, either by harming vital areas or disrupting a sense like sight. Kent admonished himself a moment later. He could have probably done so. He had just forgotten Metallic Extension… again. He should have used Penetrate in addition, but it had slipped his mind. Most likely because he had only used the skill to double cast his melee attack at short range. Completely different from how the skill was supposed to be used.

He realized his blunder and shot another pair of knives at the monster. The expected damage wasn’t much and the reality didn’t differ much, the skill losing quite a bit of efficiency through the metallic extension but one of the knives hit the monster's jaw, causing a violent shake from the monster. Presumably, it tried to dislodge the knife. Which worked, but it enlarged the wound quite a bit in the meantime.

Kent had been exceedingly lucky to have irritated the boss so much. In the few seconds, the turrl had stopped pursuing him he gained dozens of paces on the monster. Allowing him to shoot several more knives at the almost still-standing monster.

He accelerated two knives, both infused with the energy signature of Penetrate. Its effect surely minimal as of right now, but he had the stamina to spend.

The monster in response vehemently squeaked and rushed him again.

Kent kept running and trying to hit the monster with his sharper knives. In total only half hit, though each was amplified by the weak boost that penetrate offered. At some point, Metallic Extension had leveled, but even that didn’t help much. The base values of both skills seemingly too little.

With mana running low – having never really trying to save any during the fight – Kent grew a bit desperate. With how things were, he was likely doomed. His secondary weapons not really being up to the task had been an issue. Now he had two options. Either he could use his two real weapons as projectiles – which was bound to be inefficient given how things had been going –, or he could use his cloak to give him another fifteen seconds of intangibility in which he would try to damage the turrl in close combat.

His decision was easy. He had a bit more time and distance, but he didn’t want to waste all his weapons. It was hopefully to be a good decision.

He chose his good dagger and aimed for the still charging hybrid spreader’s head.

The thaumic-dagger accelerated and impacted the monster almost head on. This time the impact seemed to have a greater impact than each of the previous times. Though it seemed to be exclusively the properties of the knife that made the impact, because the flight time was just a bit over two seconds and the monsters speed the same.

The monster was visibly strained from the damaged it had just sustained and tried to dislodge dagger. Kent had made up his mind, he charged to retrieve the dagger and finish the monster off in melee. His mana was low already, and he wouldn’t disarm by himself.

He charged ahead, a flash of information provided by Metallic Presence flashed though his mind, irritating him, bringing no helpful information. The passive one-hour activation frequency seemingly having passed he was able to focus his full attention on the situation at hand.

He wove around the bite the monster was extending towards him and stabbed the monster’s neck with all his might. The other hand, meanwhile fumbled for the other dagger. The moment the monster’s neck got cut he dislodged the other dagger and activated his cloak.

He wove around the monster intangible, impacting the tough hide with each knife as often as he could.

When the cloaks effect dropped and Kent was completely drained of mana and almost out of stamina the turrl still stood, though endlessly close to death given by the blood flow all over its head region.

With a last strain of effort it spit at Kent, before falling face over.

With both hands to deliver even more power Kent drove his thaumic dagger down on the turrls head, the slight haze around the dagger providing enough might to piece the skull.

New Notification Log Entries:

You have slain “Somniferous Hybrid Spreader” Level 20! No experience can be gained until level up completed.

You have completed the Quest - Tranquil Pond Completion

…

As Kent tired to read the notifications his eyes dropped and he knew that he was in for another round of venom induced sleep.