This was going to be more challenging than I thought.
I knew that trying to steal the last hit on a monster while a Hero was fighting would take some skill and luck, but not this much.
In my foolish excitement, I had gone for a steal the next match but ran into three major problems.
The first was my range. Despite the help of shooting downward, If they got far enough away, I would have to climb down the tree and travel to a closer one. Which was risky as I couldn't see where I was walking while in the fog of war and could miss the trees or accidentally walk into the fight and get crushed to death.
The next problem was finding a Hunter who was fighting a monster. After all, they could be in four different parts of the forest and only two hunters.
The third problem was easily the biggest. It was that not every Hunter does the same amount of damage to a monster. In my attempt to steal, I got lucky finding a hunter but lost six reputations just trying to keep up with them, only for the Hunter to kill it from around ten percent hp left in a single attack.
My goal now was to find a way to circumvent these problems while doing matches normally to get back my lost reputation. Of course, I was firing as many arrows as possible the entire time to increase my DEX stat. Just from the time I climbed the tree the first time and from my steal attempt, I had already managed to increase it once.
As for the problems, the first and third seemed the hardest, so I focused on the second. I found resources online that showed the positioning of every monster in the forest. It also showed something called a 'clear.' It was the most common way for a Hunter to kill every monster in the forest. Another thing I learned was that monsters respawned, meaning that if I knew the area, I could get multiple attempts to steal the kill. That was all I could find for that on the first night as I was tired of looking at Minion Media, so instead, I moved on to another idea I had.
"Is there anywhere I could practice shooting a bow?" I spoke to Paul, who was playing with Richie.
Paul had a toy sword and a fake mustache while playing the villain.
Richie wore a mighty cape and a toy sword as he pointed it into the sky, yelling, "Haha! Mr. Evil Minion, today is the day I, Mega Mighty Minion, strike you down!"
I felt a little lousy cutting in on their Father and son time and would have instead asked Charlotte, but she was at her book club.
"Ohohoh! Do you think you can defeat me? Try it if you dare!" Paul responded, twirling his fake mustache.
He then turned to me and responded.
"There should be a shooting range somewhere; just look on Minion Media; there's an app in Other called Minion Map." He spoke.
Now that I think about it, I realize I had never looked at the Other on Minion Media. However, before I could do so, Richie spoke.
"Uncle Newbie! Please, please, please, please! play with me and Daddy!" Richie spoke.
Maybe the shooting range could wait. I quickly adorned an evil-looking top hat and magic wand before speaking.
"It is I, sidekick to Mr Evil Minion! Magic Monster Minion!" I spoke, aiming my magic wand at Richie.
Although I couldn't see a difference, I could tell Richie was happy with my choice.
"All right, Mega Mighty Minion, prepare for battle!" Paul spoke.
Paul charged Richie with his sword held high. Without hesitation, Richie slashed straight through his own Father, who slumped over dead. Richie then turned to me, signifying my turn on the chopping block. I pretended to cast a convoluted spell, but he quickly rushed me and stabbed me through the heart; I cried out in pain as he twisted the blade before slashing it straight up and through my skull, killing me instantly.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Over the next few days, I would go about matches normally. Which unfortunately involved dying a lot.
Then, I would research how to solve my other two problems before heading to the shooting range.
It cost a gold coin for entry and another coin for a thousand arrows, which was more expensive than I had hoped but still a manageable price nonetheless. In three days, I increased my DEX five times, which meant I lost five coins, not including the entry cost, which made it eight total.
I also discovered some stuff that could help with Operation Steal, as I was now calling it. The first thing I finally managed to memories the clears and areas that the monster spawned.
Next, I found a page with the monster's health bars on top of the base stats for heroes.
From there, I could figure out what Hunter specifically could leave the monsters at low hp by calculating their abilities and attack damage. From what I found, six reliable Hunters would deal just enough damage that I could finish the monster off.
The first was King Arthur, who was the Hunter I had seen kill the wolf from before. The other five were Loki, King in Yellow, Anat, Cinderella, and Little Red Riding Hood. The only problem with this was that I would only be sure of what Hunter was in the forest. If I entered the forest and lost the reputation, I would not know which Hunters were in the match.
However, that problem was solved relatively quickly. After a quick search, I found out that you could say 'Match Info' when inside a match to see the scoreboard, which happened to have every Hero's name currently in the lobby. The only problem left was if I messed up when I was walking through the Fog of War and lost my way or, worse, ran into the monster fighting the Hunter.
With this information, I decided to go for Operation Steal again.
It only took two matches for me to find a hunter that fit the requirements; it was Cinderella. Remembering her 'clear,' I headed out and into the forest.
{Reputation - 1}
{Reputation - 1}
{Reputation -1}
Once I made it up the tree, I waited for her, and only a few moments later, she arrived.
She had curly black dyed hair, with the original only being slightly visible at the roots. Her ghostly pale white face made her red eyes, with black eyeliner and black lipstick, stand out. Her red gothic dress was embroidered with black roses and broken hearts. In her hands was not a weapon but instead a dancing flame, hence the name Cinderella.
Also, her username was 'Hanging_w1th_my_gnomies7'. I
It only took a few seconds for her to find a giant stag beetle whose height reached to her knees. The Stag beetle moved towards her, ready to attack, but she quickly shut it down by throwing multiple fireballs at it, preventing its assault. She then caused an eruption of fire below the Beetle, causing it to scream in pain. It tried to run, but she pulled up a wall of flame in the direction of its escape.
The Beetle's hp was already at fifty percent, with its hp still slowly dropping as it was burned alive. Nowhere left to run, the Beetle made a last-ditch charge toward Cinderella. She threw multiple fireballs at it, but it refused to stop pushing straight through.
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Eventually, it reached her and was about to bite her, but she shot out a wave of fire, causing it to get sent flying back, which unfortunately made it no longer in my strike range.
Panicked, I rushed down the tree and followed in its direction.
{Reputation -1}
{Reputation -1}
{Reputation -1}
Cinderella had gotten there first and had already hit it a couple of times, with its hp already being at only five percent left. I prepared my bow with all ten arrows and aimed, waiting for the right moment. She threw another fire, dropping its hp to two percent. I waited for the burn to drop its hp to one percent and then fired.
*Thwump*
I hit it.
But, it was unfortunately already dead. Cinderella had thrown out another fireball, killing it before my arrows could reach. Next time, I would have to shoot preemptively and just hope that its HP ticked low enough that my arrows would kill. It was okay, however, as eventually, the stag would respawn, and I would get another chance. With that, I returned to my original tree and waited.
{Reputation -1}
{Reputation -1}
{Reputation -1}
The reputation was starting to be expensive, but it would be worth it if I could get the kill on one monster. After waiting around, I saw Cinderella come back. Again, the Beetle came at her, and she threw out her attacks, causing the Beetle's hp to decrease rapidly. Furthermore, once it was low, I started aiming my bow with all ten arrows loaded—five percent, four, three, two, and finally one.
*Thwump*
I hit it.
But it didn't die. It didn't seem to take any damage.
I tried that match two or three more times, but every time, it didn't take any damage.
After the match, I researched and discovered that every time a monster is killed, it is revived with increased stats.
This should be fine, but they also get increased defence, meaning I can't damage them. It seemed that it would be a more strenuous endeavour than I thought.
The next few days, I did more stats training and played matches, soon passing the one-month anniversary of my life as a minion.
I even managed to increase my DEX by seven. Unfortunately, I had a few more attempts at Operation Steal, but none of them worked out. I didn't want to lose hope, but it was looking a little grim for this idea.
I had already started researching other ways to increase XP quickly. A new idea I saw that I was thinking about trying was buying XP. It cost a considerable amount, with one XP being five gold, but it was much easier to make gold than XP.
Despite this, I still hadn't lost complete hope. Now and then, I would find a suitable Hunter and try for the steal, but nothing worked out. It felt so close, but I couldn't quite get there no matter what I tried, which leads us to now.
I had gotten into a match with a King in Yellow. So I went straight into the forest until I was sure I was in the right area.
{Reputation -1}
{Reputation -1}
{Reputation -1}
Once I was there, I waited. I was in a different spot this time as each Hunter had a distinct clear.
Soon came the King in Yellow with the username 'PleaseDon'tInvade.'
He looked creepy. His blond hair was slicked back, and his skin the colour of gold, or possibly even gold itself. He had empty eye sockets and a mouth with no tongue or teeth inside. He wore a yellow dress that was tight to his body, and something seemed to be wriggling and writhing underneath. His arms were unresponsive, simply following in whatever direction he moved in. His head also seemed unnatural, almost as if it was propped up by something, unable to hold itself up. He looked like a husk, almost as if he was a gold puppet being controlled.
Looking at his 'feet' seemed to prove my theory true. Black tentacles emerged from the bottom of his dress and dragged him around.
I thought the horror show would end with that, but then the monster appeared.
It was arguably more terrifying than the King in Yellow. Its entire body was made of bone, with pieces of flesh rotting on some parts. Mostly, it looked human-like, except for its abnormally lengthy spine and dog skull. If I remember it was called a Skinwalker.
The fight quickly began with the King in Yellow's black tentacles shooting out from its eye sockets and wrapping themselves around the Skinwalker, crushing it.
The Skinwalker tried to resist but failed miserably as its HP slowly ticked to seventy percent. It then managed to break free and move on to the attack. It tried to slam its jaws shut onto the King in Yellow Head, but the black tentacles dragged him out of the way. The King in Yellow's mouth then unhinged itself as a flurry of black tentacles flew out, each slamming into the Skinwalker, dropping its hp to forty. Then, the unexpected happened.
Beowulf sprinted towards the King in Yellow from the Fog of War.
He slashed him, causing him to stumble back while his health dropped. Soon following behind was King Arthur, who also snuck in, delivering a flurry of blows to the solo King in Yellow.
The Beowulf had the username 'IWannaInvade' and the King Arthur was 'FightmeBr0999'.
This was the first time I had ever seen this happen. It was an invasion.
It's where the enemy Hunters sneak across the river and into the opposing team's forest and steal camps, plus fight against the other teams' hunters two versus one.
King in Yellow tried to fight back but was quickly overwhelmed. At one point, King Arthur dashed in, his daggers glowing as he prepared to pierce King in Yellow heart, but the Skinwalker got in the way, sinking its jaws into his shoulder and thrashing around. Beowulf quickly sprang into action to help his comrade.
The King in Yellow took this opportunity to unhinge his jaw again and sent out a flurry of black tentacles that hit all three of them. The Skinwalkers HP dropped to thirty percent. This seemed like the perfect opportunity.
I prepared my bow with all ten arrows, ready to fire at a moment's notice as I watched the fight unfold.
The King in Yellow went on the offence now as Beowulf and King Arthur tried to deal with the Skin Walker.
He shot out tentacle after tentacle, each hitting King Arthur and Beowulf like powerful whips. Annoyed, Beowulf slashed the Skinwalker hard, causing it to stumble back and drop to fifteen percent hp. He then charged towards the King in Yellow, slashing him across the chest. Everyone was starting to get low.
King in Yellow had around ten percent left, Beowulf fifteen, and King Arthur five percent. While Beowulf attacked King in Yellow, King Arthur knocked the Skinwalker down before turning to help his partner. The Skinwalker was at ten percent. King in Yellow went back onto the defensive as he moved backward, throwing out black tentacles to slow them down.
The problem was they were getting away from me, and the only tree nearby would require me to walk in between them and the Skinwalker, who was slowly getting up.
I had no time to think about it and rushed down the tree. When I got close to the bottom of the tree, I shot an arrow into it and used it to lift myself off the tree and get myself to the floor with the help of gravity.
{Reputation -1}
With the direction of the tree in mind, I rushed through the black fog toward it, trying not to pay attention to the sounds of fighting around me. However, as I was running, I heard something coming towards me. It was the Skinwalker. I ran as fast as my minion body could take me. It kept getting closer and closer. Louder and louder. Until...
*Slam*
Right in front of me was a foot made of bone. My heart stopped as I looked up to see the Skinwalker right above me. To my surprise, however, it ran right past me and towards the sounds of fighting. I had no time to feel relieved as I had to quickly get to this tree before the Hunters killed the Skinwalker.
{Reputation -1}
Soon after, I made it to the tree and shot my two arrows onto the floor and one inside the tree. I then pushed against it and knocked myself over. The problem was that one of the arrows got knocked away in my hasty fall. Panicked, I tried moving myself to the tree with just one arrow but couldn't move well enough.
I tried shooting another arrow, but it was too tricky while knocked over. With no other way, an Idea popped into my head. I tried rolling towards the arrow. The entire world spun as I moved through the fog. It worked as I picked it up and speed rolled back, but I worried that it had cost me too much time.
{Reputation -1}
I latched myself onto the tree and sprinted upwards, regretting that I had spent no time upgrading agility.
{Reputation -1}
Soon, I made it out of the Fog of War and loaded my bow with all ten arrows.
Aiming it as I looked around. I had made it in time. The two intruders had just killed the King in Yellow and turned their attention to the Skinwalker.
It still had ten percent left.
I pulled my bowstring back and waited patiently.
King Arthur rushed in, stabbing the Skinwalker twice, dropping its hp to four percent. Then Beowulf prepared an attack that would undoubtedly kill it without me getting a chance to shoot my arrows. Thankfully, he missed. That's when King Arthur rushed in. Predicting that he would go for a double stab, I would have to hit it between the two stabs.
Too early, and it won't kill; too late, and it's already dead.
I waited for the first dagger to almost hit before firing my shot.
*Thwump*
{Critical hit! 7.87damage dealt}
{Skinwalker has been slain!}
{Level up}
{Level up}
{Level up}
{Level up}
{Level up}
{Xp gained: 580}
{Gold Gained: 169}
{Reputation - 1000}
My head was filled with information. I didn't pay too much attention to it as I was ecstatic that this had finally worked.
The two invaders stood stunned until they followed the ten arrows back to me.
I froze as they both stared at me; that's when I had an idea.
I thrust my bow into the air before quickly returning it to my side and repeating the action.
I was emoting.