Fighting and screams emerged from the opening of the twin doors. From the darkness within the room, he spotted flashes of skills, and sometimes a healing flash from Maera highlighted her tense figure, and the dark patches of liquid covering the floor.
Blood. Noah could smell the familiar stench from a mile away, or perhaps that was thanks to his tamed monster's beastly senses.
Whatever the reason was, Noah, on the back of Gluttony, entered the room.
You have entered the lords room - Lord Vanquisher
Noah didn’t know what to expect, but honestly, it wasn’t too far away from his imagination of what a boss monster would look like. Monstrous. Powerful.
It was a knight that was taller than a three story building, with streamlined armour, and a helmet with piercing blue eyes that leered at him as he entered. Noah could feel that it was rightfully a lord of a dungeon.
One of her knights lay dead on the floor, surrounded in a puddle of his own blood. In pieces.
Noah didn’t really care for Maera’s life. Her actions would have most likely gotten them all killed if they hadn’t found the secret entrance. However, it wasn’t as if he was filled with wrath. It was for a noble cause, just not one Noah subscribed to.
He had to focus on his own life before thinking about anything else.
The elf princess was fighting, dodging the attacks of the knight. Noah watched, studying the monster so that he could better understand its moves.
On the third strike of the lord's huge two-handed sword, it suddenly dashed in a straight line, bringing its weapon along with him. It used a sword skill, sundering the floor, then projecting the blade in a straight line. It was fast, but not one Noah couldn’t dodge.
Then the sixth hit arrived.
An icy hue emerged over its knightly armour, and the temperature of the room underwent a frosty transformation. Underfoot, an ice formation crashed out, sending lances toward the scattering elves.
Grabbing hold of the princess, the head knight barely managed to get out of the skills proximity, only just catching his foot. He stomped, breaking the ice, but it was clear his movements weren’t as swift, or as graceful as Noah remembered.
More than that however, was the princess’ constitution. Tears of red trickled down her face, and she could hardly remain on her own two feet unassisted.
“Do we help?” Thraz asked.
Noah didn’t know whether Thraz just wanted to get in on the action, or if he was concerned for the maiden in need of help, but he was notified with his next words.
“I want to fight it.” He said, gripping his axe tight.
There’s that then. Noah shook his head. He was of the same mind as his dragonborn friend. His hands itched in anticipation for a good fight, but he wouldn’t let a golden opportunity to study his opponent, and understand its vulnerabilities go to waste.
After all, he was an assassin that relied on an overpowered sudden charge. He wasn’t going to ignore that.
Maera glanced over, help signalled over eyes, but Noah wouldn’t listen. Besides, for her, he had to kill it in one fell swoop. One attack. That was his plan. There was also the tier four taming mission he had to think of.
A few minutes passed, and Noah finally spotted what could be considered a weakness. True, it didn’t take a genius to figure out that it had a gaping hole in the back of its armour, but it took that long for it to turn around completely.
To be accurate, it took twenty five strikes for it to show its back. And that was where Noah would attack. For that, he needed the elves to fight for longer. But time wasn’t on their side. Battered and exhausted, they wouldn’t last much longer.
“Everyone, attack,” Noah ordered. It was a simple plan of action. Simply attack. But it caused the others to look at him as if he was crazy.
However, it was Declan who nodded first, and of course his loyal tamed monster before even him: Krall.
They charged forward. Declan knew what Noah was thinking, so he had the team focus on one side. The right side, so that it provided Noah the space he needed to work on the left.
He’s a good leader. Noah admitted.
Throughout the entire time since they entered, he was constantly growing, evolving.
Aren’t I the same? Noah smiled at the thought.
Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
No longer was he a loner apart from a couple friends in Miles and Peter. His days of wandering the streets, scrounging for food, was over. He had learned to trust the dragonborn, somewhat, and had gained two loyal companions in Krall, and Gluttony.
Noah didn’t know why, but an all consuming urge to kill the armoured knight coursed through his body. Like it was some sort of destiny, or something. He didn’t believe in anything like that, so it was a strange sensation.
Whatever it was, he placed it to the back of his mind. The time for Noah to strike was approaching. He counted the attacks, twenty.
Blending into the shadows, he activated [Shadowed Presence] to hide further within. Along with utilising the Monster Shard, with the help of Gluttony’s natural camouflage, there weren't many in the same tier that could detect his figure as he stalked his prey.
The knight swept his sword across the ground, slamming into Cai’s shield. The quality of his shield, or his strength, was lacking. Shield splitting, he was sent hurtling through the air, crashing, rolling against the ground.
His already weakened body twitched, before he stopped moving altogether.
Declan was furious, shouting, but there wasn’t much he could do. He knew better than to act on emotion. He needed to stay calm, give orders until Noah could make his attack.
Krall and Thraz were mighty, but they had to play it safe. Staying out of the way from the lords rending attacks as each one was capable of splitting them in two.
Lorena fired her powerful arrows, yet the only damage they did was etch a light scratch into the lord's armour. However, the fact that she was even able to scratch its armour meant that it wasn’t an impossible monster to deal with.
Even Noah himself was curious if he could penetrate its armour with his most powerful attack, but he wouldn’t leave anything to chance.
Finally, the twenty-fifth strike arrived and with it, Noah’s moment of attack.
From the shadows, he blasted toward the knight. Activating all his skills, along with his shards, the mana, and expansion vanished from his body. However, the strength it brought with the cost was staggering.
Like the air was sucked out of his chest. Spear snapping through the air like a viper, his arm screamed in protest.
Hit! Noah chanted within his mind, but it only lasted a split second as his spear found its mark. Tearing through the weakness in its armour like a hot knife through butter, Noah thought it was the end.
He was wrong.
Rumbling, cracking, the so-called ‘lord’ crawled into a ball, hands over head.
Noah had a terrible feeling, so he attempted to attack the weakness again, but nothing so much as a noise left the lithe set of armour. Noah’s heart sunk, and then with a blast of mana, and ice, sending Noah backwards in trepidation.
Refusing to let the knight enter an empowered form, Noah disappeared into the shadows, and emerged from the front this time.
Once more, he activated all the skills at his disposal, and aimed it at the knight's helmet. It wasn’t entirely a random attack as he noticed a small indentation at its forehead. Maybe it was a design flaw, or perhaps it had another reason Noah didn’t know about.
After using his attacks for so long, against so many monsters, Noah had long learnt to control his spear with proficiency.
Using the fact the knight was still gathering power, Noah battled against its icy aura. The cold nipped his flesh, and even started to form a thin layer of ice around the bite of frost.
Gritting his teeth, he stormed toward the monster. He threw his spear at its head as hard as he possibly could. The muscles in his arm tore under the stress of using all his skills for a second time, and not to mention he wasn’t fully recovered from his previous fights.
It soared through the air, and clashed against the knight's head. Sparks flew, ice shattered, and then the spear tip disappeared within its head.
You defeated a - Level 65 Lord Vanquisher
You have Levelled up!
| Noah ( Phantom Lancer ) level 51 -> Noah ( Phantom Lancer ) level 55
Krall, the Scourge of the Jungle has levelled up.
| Krall level 51 -> Krall level 55
Gluttony has Levelled up.
| Gluttony level 33 -> Gluttony level 38
You are being watched
| Dhoom, the God Slayer has sponsored you.
| Grace Coins added.
| Verkal, the Lord Annihilator has sponsored you.
| Grace Coins adde
| Akrum, the Mounted Terror has sponsored you.
| Grace Coins added.
| Lenid, the Monster Hunter has sponsored you.
| Grace Coins added.
| Srussea Corp. has sponsored you.
| Grace Coins added.
| Ekralo, the Beast Tamer has sponsored you.
| Grace Coins added.
| Nathan Kayne, the Master Fisher has sponsored you.
| Grace Coins added.
| Kromlin, the Eldritch Being has sponsored you.
| Grace Coins added.
| Alissa, the Blood Witch has sponsored you.
| Grace Coins added.
| Meelo, the Delver has sponsored you.
…
You have cleared the Dungeon - Birthright Castle!
| Grace Coins rewarded.
| You have gained the World's First Title - [Solo Delver II]: Be the first to clear a dungeon. +5 to all stats.
| You have gained the World's First Title - [Dungeoneer II]: Successfully clear a dungeon. +3 to a stat of your choice.
Noah’s eyes twitched at the amount of system notifications, but he was happy. The only thing he was surprised about was the Level gain. It was a staggering amount of experience compared to what he was receiving before.
Maybe it was because it was a lord class monster? Noah didn’t know.
His eyes wandered toward beyond the huge throne that was built out of ancient brick and stone, where a diamond encrusted chest lay.
Just as he was about to move, the lord vanquisher emitted a dense mist.