Day 82.

Before the wave started at noon, I needed to take a break.

I had been at this for more than a few days and my mind was tired. A migraine was on the verge of forming and my stomach was rumbling. Some rest and recuperation were in order as was a nice meal.

My cooking wasn't the best in the world but living on my own for the last half a dozen years forced me to get better at it. I was no Michelin star chef, but I could get by. Especially for my own taste buds.

I had to buy more cooking utensils since the ones we had were taken down south but that wasn't a huge deal. They were miniscule in price and I had the points to spare.

Spices, oils, seasonings, the whole nine yards. It all added up to a few hundred points but that was nothing. A single beast gave more than that.

Campfire cooking was an art that I didn't have a lot of experience with but the ability to throw as much wood as I wanted on the fire while controlling the temperature with my ice was a cheat I used to my advantage.

No matter how much fuel the fire had, it would never get hotter than I let it which was great for keeping a steady temperature.

It wasn't a standard grill or anything, but it got the job done.

The food was... average. It wasn't great but it wasn't bad. I had noticed as I increased in levels and stats normal food didn't taste the same. It took more of it to fill me up and lacked the flavor it once had.

I wasn't certain, but I thought it had to do with the level of the meat. If the meat came from a high-level beast, then it tasted better than meat from a lower-level beast.

It probably had something to do with the amount of essence but I wasn't too concerned with it. That sounded like something a chef or cook would worry about.

I hadn't prepared any high-level meat but I should have.

During my break, my mind couldn't help but snap back to my phrase. I caught myself thinking about it even though I was specifically trying not to. It was nagging at my brain and I couldn't help but wonder about it.

'I'm still here.'

Other variations came about like 'I remain' or something along the lines of steadfast and enduring.

All of them caused the same feeling to varying degrees. Some had more of a reaction than other's but they all didn't feel right.

Even though I wanted to take a break, I wasn't able to. My mind simply wouldn't let it go. It was like a popcorn kernel stuck between teeth, you couldn't help but poke at it.

Even when your tongue and gums got sore, it was impossible to let go.

I barely remembered to buy another mana stone for the Rune to use before the wave. They ran out a few hours after the wave and I had to keep buying more every time which was annoying.

When the ding of the wave arriving sounded out, I was still no closer than before.

It was with a moderate amount of frustration that I gripped my hammer for the wave. If the wood had been any lower in quality, it would have shattered from my clutch.

As the monsters closed in, they had something different about them. They didn't act the same as usual animals and they had a vulgar feeling emanating from them.

They acted almost like they had rabies or something like that. Completely rabid compared to normal. The monsters already had a higher amount of aggression but these took it even further.

Identify called them [Demonic Leopards].

What I was seeing visually didn't make me think of leopards. There was none of the feline grace nor the sleek killing form that cats usually had. There was a bulk to them that seemed unnatural.

Their fur was all black with hints of red that made them look even worse. The streaks of red looked like veins of blood which explained the accompanying scent of blood and copper. Like they had bathed in blood before the wave.

It was unpleasant.

I wasn't certain what affinity the leopards had but if I had to guess it would be blood and demonic or something along those lines.

The fight started as normal but it quickly turned feral. My hammer obliterated them every swing but they fought differently than the normal monsters causing me to change my style as well.

This wasn't the fighting I was experienced with. Usually, during the waves, the monsters were highly aggressive and always went for the kill. They did everything they could to kill the defenders they were sent against.

While it may result in injury, their main goal was to kill.

These... didn't. It was like they were okay with throwing away their lives for a small wound. While I was bringing my hammer down on one, another would leap not on my back, but my foot to cause a small wound.

Their claws skittered off my armor most of the time but their repeated attacks carved grooves in the ice over time.

They focused on the same spots which was alarming. Even the new ones that rushed in after the fact stuck to the same spots of attack. It was like all of them were given a template on where to attack.

It was concerning because that template aligned with where my least defended spots were.

Joints that I couldn't reinforce with armor underneath for mobility, tendons that would cripple if they got through, and flesh wounds compared to fatal ones.

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I got the feeling they were aiming to cripple, not kill.

As their claws dug deeper, I started to worry slightly.

Even though I was killing them at unprecedented speeds, some were still able to land attacks. It was impossible to kill them fast enough to remain unmolested.

I could do it, but it would expend too much energy and mana to be sustainable.

The alarm didn't stop there either. The beasts started to work together as well. One would go high while another would go low, forcing me to choose which to defend.

None of the previous waves had this level of coordination. It didn't have the feeling like they were being directed like some of the previous waves, but like they were doing it themselves.

Like they knew they were going to die and teamed up to land at least one attack before they did so.

It was a startling display of lacking self-preservation. Monsters usually didn't have much self-preservation but these seemed to have even less than normal.

Claws worked through ice and drew blood for the first time during the fight almost an hour into it. I had been fighting the destruction of my armor the best I could but they still managed to get through.

I pushed my Law into the areas they were targeting and tried my best to use [Ice Manipulation(Un)] to keep it intact but I wasn't able to keep up.

They were relentless.

After blood was drawn, they went into even more of a frenzy. It was like a boost was applied and they all got stronger. Faster.

Another cut appeared on my skin and it happened again.

The pattern repeated a few times and it became harder to fend them off. [Frozen Patchwork(R)] worked through my body to freeze over the bleeding cuts but that didn't stop new ones from forming.

As one cut froze over, two more were opened up. As the wounds closed, the boost the leopards got also lowered. It was like they got a boost for every open wound that I had.

The new ability was something I wasn't used to and it was hard to counter while in the middle of the fight. I had to come up with ideas while fighting as best I could.

The fact they were pushing me was both surprising and nice. It showed that even though they weren't in the E-rank, I could still get pushed by certain beasts.

The last wave didn't carry with it the difficulty that I had come to like. The Vine Bears were a fight. It was a true battle in every sense of the word.

The ants were as well. They could take some punishment and dish it out themselves. The 27th wave couldn't. The beasts were some form of dog that wasn't one I knew and they didn't hold up very well to either hammer or cold.

It was almost disappointing coming out of that fight mostly intact.

I had just gone through a huge power boost with 4 skills and my Law upgrading but it wasn't the fight I had come to enjoy.

This, though, this was a fight. It was a different kind of fight but a fight nonetheless. They weren't the massive bears that could push me around, nor the metal ants that could take a few hammer blows, but they were putting up a resistance.

An annoying resistance, but it was enough to feel the pressure, the thrill of battle. That heat wasn't just imaginary anymore either.

Previously, I had equated it to battle fever. The feeling I got while in battle was a rush that I couldn't get anywhere else. I had thought that it was all just in my head but that didn't turn out to be true.

All of my meditation over the past few days made me more in tune with what I was feeling within my body. I had been monitoring minute changes while trying to suss out my phrase and that carried over well to other feelings.

The battle fever was an actual feeling deep inside me near where the Spirit Anchor resided. Near where the fluctuations I had been keeping a close eye on.

They weren't the same, but they were related somehow.

With this new information, I went in a different direction with my Anchor. If how I felt while in battle resonated with it, then I would try using it.

I didn't make a phrase out of it but stuck with the base idea of battle. Of a good fight with a worthy foe.

The idea sparked the same reaction as the phrases I had been playing with did. A churning that was near, but not exactly what I was looking for.

It was another clue in the right direction. I knew that 'I'm still here' sounded too defeatist to be right and this proved it. If the idea of battle was close, then it was something that touched on both of those aspects.

Phrases still felt better than ideas but I continued trying to find the right idea. If I could narrow down that, it would make figuring out the phrase easier.

While smashing and crumpling the leopards throwing themselves at me, my mind pointed inward. More wounds appeared due to that which only made it harder, but it was the needed pressure that I wanted.

The fight with the pylon had been too easy to use for inspiration and this wave was making up for that.

Every dead body that littered the area, every body that I stood over to continue the fight helped narrow it further. I felt it building up inside me. It was asking to be realized, to finally be let free.

It wanted to be formed just as much as I wanted it to.

What Jonathan described as a feeling growing from his core was exactly what I was feeling now. The power carried with it a question. It was asking who I was.

For the longest time, that very question had stumped me. I had been looking in the wrong spot to come up with the answer.

I was a leader, yes, but that wasn't who I was. It was a temporary title that I had and I didn't even think I was that good of a leader yet.

Survivor and fighter were both wrong answers as well. While I was both, it wasn't what the power was looking for.

There were other answers to that question that I had come up with but they felt so... futile now. Now that I was being asked, those felt lesser somehow. My mind tried to paint me in a different light and that light was falling away now. There were none of the noble or righteous things I colored my vision of myself with. Only the bare truth was left and I could see that clearly now.

I was in the midst of battle with hundreds of enemies who wanted me dead. Who threw their lives away to leave but a scratch on my form. I stood alone against hundreds and reveled in it.

It didn't matter if I was anything else. It didn't matter what other word I came up with to describe who I was. There was only one that mattered right now. Only one encompassed all that I needed it to.

Warrior

I was a warrior.

In every sense of the word. My idea of a warrior probably didn't match everyone's but that wasn't what mattered. It was asking how I saw myself and that was entirely subjective.

A warrior of old. Of the ones in stories. The idealistic version that was probably never really what a warrior was.

None of that mattered. It was the answer that it was looking for. Now that who I was had an answer, the power moved on to needing something else.

It needed the phrase that it would anchor itself to.

'I'm still here' could have worked, but I knew what was wrong with it now. The idea of battle could have also worked but it was wrong for similar reasons. Battle wasn't what anchored me. It wasn't the idea that I resonated with.

Neither was the fact I was still here while others weren't. It took me most of the fight to realize it, but it was obvious now that I had.

In a fight, there would only be one winner. There would be the victor, and the defeated. One would live on, while the other died.

One would be forgotten, and one would be left standing.

It was so similar to 'I'm still here' that I was surprised I hadn't thought of it. It was so close that it should have been easy.

My hammer had reaped lives and cut journeys short. Their strength of arms failing to be enough to bring me low. It didn't matter how else the fight went, or how injured or wounded I ended up. If I was still upright at the end, I won.

There was only a slight change that was needed. A small tweak to make it right. It wasn't the fact that I was still here, it was the fact I waded over the bodies of the fallen and stood over their corpses.

My power exploded and I felt my hammer light up with energy. It misted anything that it hit with an ease I hadn't felt in a long while. The leopards' bodies couldn't hold up anymore.

My spirit flowed around me, into my armor, my hammer, my ice, everything I used to conduct the battle. Everything I needed it to. They carried with them a piece of me which empowered them like nothing else had.

Where chunks of ice used to break, they held firm. Where my armor used to fail and crack, it weathered anything thrown at it.

My phrase was anchored and formed and it would not fail me. It was who I was.

I'm Still Standing.