The second part. I'll clear up the last one after I get back from my tuition lessons.

*

A special update on the current happenings on Royal Road, brought to you by Flaming Gaming News Media.

At the Crypt that was located to the North, an epic battle is taking place!! A punitive force led by a Paladin known as Gordon has begun fighting with an army comprising of an alliance between Orcs and undead. As observed by many veteran players, Gordon looks to be one of the rising powers in this new generation.

The punitive force's hit-and-switch tactic where the Vanguard and Main Force would take turns to engage the Orcish Lines had been working wonders. Using archers as snipers and mages as artillery, they managed to contain the massive Orc army.

At this point, the Orcish Forces received reinforcements in the form of Undead at a critical point of the battle, when both frontline forces were in the midst of switching. Not only did the enemy forces immediately swell in size, the undead had caught the Vanguard off guard. The Vanguard, who had their health depleted, were definitely in trouble at this point. It's now anybody's game, so what will happen next? Stay tuned to find out!!

... and now a word from our sponsors.

****

Gordon pinched the bridge of his nose as he observed this new development, having seated himself at the rear (at the insistence of his friends; he would have sorely loved to head out to the frontlines). Suddenly, He motioned to the priests located there with him.

“Could you cast an AoE healing spell on the Vanguard from here?” he asked.

The priests nodded and raised their hands, channeling mana and Holy Water through their fingertips and firing it out in a golden shower (no pun intended).

“Freya’s beauty knows no bounds. Her mercy and grace rains down upon her followers. Healing Rain!!”

A gentle light began to fall upon the battlefield. The spell not only had the effect of healing the hit points and increasing the stats of allies over a large radius, but also has a negative effect upon the undead. As a result, the Undead suffered severe damage and lost their regenerative ability.

“I could do with a buff as well, guys.” Gordon got the priests to cast buffs such as Holy Blessing and Heavenly Song on him. He brandished his hammer as he started moving towards the frontlines himself.

“My friends told me to stay at the back unless it is an emergency. I guess this situation counts as one then?” Gordon happily said as he swung his hammer upon arrival, causing several undead to fall apart and break into many scattered pieces. The impact of the hammer left a gaping hole in the ground where it struck.

“And as such, at long last I can cut loose a little.” Gordon said to himself as he raised the hammer for another attack.

And before his eyes he could easily make out the giant skeleton warrior in the distance, its great sword wreaking havoc upon the battlefield. Gordon grinned as he appraised the prospective opponent in the distance. He swung his hammer in wide arcs, golden flames appearing on the skeletons and Orcs he beat aside and cleared a path to the foe he had chosen.Eventually the distance between the two “Generals” was cut to a sliver, with Gordon making a pre-emptive attack on the giant skeleton's arm.

For each epic battle, there must always be a fight between both bosses, right?

****

“Dang it, they just keep coming!!” I cried in dismay as I smashed the spear shaft onto the skull of another skeleton, netting another kill as the undead warrior broke apart, the rest of its hit points robbed by the blow. Even as one of these skeletons fell, several more zombies rose up quickly to take its place.

The fight against the Orcish Forces was going really well when they suddenly received reinforcements in the form of an Undead ambush. Suddenly the enemy forces had swelled in size, and although the priests had sent a Healing Rain spell, the battle had suddenly become an uphill fight.

[You have gained a level to level 40.]

On the bright side, I am gaining levels quickly in the process, the skeletons being at a much higher level than I was. I was really glad about this. On the other hand, if I died, I would lose a level and a fair amount of skill proficiency, which was not as easy to raise from my experience.

Oh well, best to just go with the flow. If I gain a good number of levels and skill proficiency before I die, it would definitely make up for the potential losses. The trouble here is that it takes a large number of kills to do this…

*TWACK*

My spear shaft moved in wide arcs as it bashed into a skeleton, smashing in his sides and flank.

*CRACK*

The next attack bashed in the skull of another skeleton, causing it to crack severely.

*SMACK*

I suppose that makes it three in a row then… That one was a zombie, though.

The 4th stance makes smashing and slashing movements easier to use and more powerful in combat. Moreover, it increases my STR and AGI by a large amount. As such, it makes this stance the most suited in fights against multiple opponents!! I still haven’t thought of a name to give it, however. (Author’s note: Suggestions, anyone? :P)

Couple it with the Stored Power, which increases the power of each attack the more I hit. And then throw in Combat immersion, which raises movement speed, agility and reflexes. With all that, I was not having too much trouble with the skeletons or zombies despite the level differences.

Despite all this, I could only bring down a skeleton after 3 or 4 good hits, and zombies tended to be able to take more punishment before they fell. As such, that Triple Kill you saw early was the result of chipping their hit points down over a period of time with multiple mobbing attacks. I made a note to myself to improve my equipment after this.

Around me, the other members of the Vanguard were faring equally well, their levels much higher than mine. Around me, skeletons and zombies continued to fall apart, hit point bars disappearing with each swing of a weapon.

However, zombies and skeletons had pretty impressive regenerative ability. Moreover, it appeared that they had a necromancer or two in the backline supporting them, as more and more zombies and skeletons rose from the dead and joined in on the battle. On the other hand, the Vanguard had no such ability collectively.

So, as you can tell, it was probably no surprise that the enemy is able to swarm us with their superiority in numbers.

And of course, zombies and skeletons had near limitless stamina. Humans naturally don’t. And with both the main force and vanguard presently occupied by the undead and Orcish forces, it was only a matter of time before our stamina runs out, as the previous plan of switching to let the teams rest in between engagements was spectacularly smashed to pieces.

I beat down another zombie with a vertical smash to the head, but the seemingly endless swarm of undead meant that I had to keep on my toes. In this melee, I was unable to relax for a moment. I made to swing my spear shaft horizontally at another zombie, but I suddenly felt a great pain shooting across my back.

[Your HP has fallen by 6%. You are bleeding.]

Case in point, it seems that I was struck by a slash to the back from a skeleton. The reduction of pain from Combat Immersion and my Endurance stat lessened the pain from the attack a little, but it still hurt like hell. It was enough to make me stagger, and I was pounced on by a number of zombies and skeletons, causing me to fall over. The skeletons and zombies began to beat on my body with their weapons.

[Your HP has fallen by 7%]

[Your HP has fallen by 4%]

[Your HP has fallen by 5%]

[Your HP has fallen by 4%]

[Your HP has fallen by 6%]

…

The danger of fighting against multiple opponents is that you can suddenly fall into situations like this. In most cases, the damage taken from multiple opponents at once is usually fatal… Have you gotten beaten up by multiple people before? It’s pretty much the same thing here.

Crap. To be taken out the proceedings at such a critical time… I gritted my teeth at the pain dealt by the blows from the zombies and skeletons. I thought back to the times where I had gotten into trouble against a large number of enemies like this… That fight against the wolves, that spot of trouble from that goblin war party, the attrition war against Combatante’s spirit soldiers. Each time, I had somehow come out from these fights alive. It seems that it will be different this time. In fact, this would be my first time dying in the game.

I was struck on the back again by a club wielded by a skeleton.

I wonder how it feels like. Death, that is.

For one thing, it seems that time slows down drastically in your mind, allowing you to think back on things. Or rather, it seems that your thinking faculties had gone into overdrive… It’s so hard to describe it, I’m no scientist, damn it.

Sigh… Looks like I won’t be able to play for the rest of the day because of this. The next 24 hours in fact. What a shame. I had set aside my Weekend for this, in order to make the most of the last week of gaming.

I rolled over. My arms, held up to defend against the attack, were slashed by a blade.

Also, that loss of levels and skill proficiency. It brought a tear to my eyes as I thought of all that hard work going down the drain. Looks like I would have to put in effort to raise them to their current levels again.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

In fact, now that I have a lot of free time freed up thanks to that death, I wonder what I can do it. The fridge needs to be restocked, the house probably wants cleaning, and I bet my sisters must be hungry right about now. They had agreed to not disturb me during this fight, but they are pretty hopeless when it comes to household matters. I should reward them with a cooked meal, and then we can laugh over that failure, I guess.

At this point, I had given up on defending myself. Everyone else was being occupied by the enemy forces, so there was probably no hope of a rescue. As such, I was just lying with a small grin on my face while getting beaten up by undead. Darn it, why does this death have to be so manly?

My HP had already fallen to critical levels. Observing the HP bar, I suddenly saw a light in the choking darkness.

How could I have forgotten about this skill? I’m such an idiot!!

That thing won’t even let me die peacefully… The gods must have cursed me on that day when I got that skill, I grumbled to myself, starting to feel my consciousness fade away.

At this point, there was not a single spot on my body that was not beaten black and blue by the zombies, but it didn’t hurt as bad as it did before.

[Your HP has fallen by 3%]

My HP fell even further, inching closer and closer… to the threshold set by the unique skill Berserk Impulse.

*****

Blake was in the main force, although thus far he hadn’t managed to meet up with Howard yet. Not to mention, he was just too lazy to just use the Whisper Feature to contact Howard, nor did he get a call from Howard himself. Most likely Howard had forgotten about him in the excitement and just went on his merry way. It would be just like him, Blake thought.

Not that he had any time to be thinking about this, he was being swarmed by angry undead!! Or, to put it in his way, there’s undead to be killed!!

The hand-and-a-half sword in his hand flashed as he cut down yet another zombie with a warrior skill, Wolf Fang. The zombie faded away to gray as it fell, its body cut into two by the attack.

Also colloquially known as the Bastard Sword, the weapon that Blake held in his hand was the middle road between a two-handed long sword and the one handed short sword, with an extended grip that allowed it to be held in either a one-handed grip or a partial two-handed grip. As a result, while it was known for its power, the Bastard Sword also had amazing versatility in battle.

Blake recovered his stance, and the arm that was free in his hand flew out in a vicious backhander that landed solidly on the face of a skeleton that was sneaking up on him, causing it to reel back as it lost balance. At the same time, Blake spun on the spot, the bastard sword flying in a horizontal arc to slice at the skeleton’s vertebrae, effectively cutting the skeleton in half.

Leaving the now crippled skeleton aside for the moment (he was aware that the skeleton will still fight even though it is in that current state), Blake turned his attentions to an Orc who thought that it would be a good thing to bury his Axe into the skull that conveniently presented itself, as occupied as it seemingly was with the skeleton.

Good use of opportunity in theory, but a fatal mistake in practice, especially since he was going up against a rather exp-hungry Blake, who had already gained a level in the proceedings of the battle.

Keeping up the momentum from the horizontal strike that fell the skeleton from earlier, Blake swung his bastard sword at the Orc’s legs, causing it to stagger as the sword bit deeply into Orc flesh, severing muscles and going deep into the bone. Perhaps stagger was putting it too mildly. The Orc went positively insane from the god-awful pain that he suddenly felt from his left leg… and then he felt nothing, as his head was lopped off by another slash to the neck, his face still holding an expression of pain and surprise.

Leaving the rather bloody and gory scene behind him, Blake cast out over the battlefield for the next wave of undead and Orcs to kill, using a foot movement known as Slipstream to cover a large amount of distance quickly.

From the distance, he finally caught of glimpse of Howard, the spear shaft that was held in his hands caving in skulls and breaking bones as it was swung about like a staff. Moreover, the stance that he assumed each time he recovered was a strange one, even though there was plenty of room for improvement. It seemed that despite his self-effacing behavior regarding his rather low level, Howard had grown by a fair bit since they both passed out from the Warrior’s Guild back at the Sleepy Fortress where they had started out at.

Growth or not, it didn’t quite stop Howard from getting ambushed by a surprise attack from the back and then getting mobbed by a gang of undead. Blake shook his head at the sight. At least that part about Howard hasn’t changed, he thought, recalling the times that he and the rest of the students of the Warrior’s Guild would sneak up on him and trap him, tickling him playfully (Howard: Ah, I completely forgot about that…).

Suddenly the mob of undead surrounding Howard exploded, their bodies soaring into the air as an explosive force sent them flying.

“What the heck?” Blake couldn’t believe his eyes.

In the midst, he could see Howard, who hadn’t changed his equipment since he had left (stingy fellow, Blake thought), but there was something oddly different about him. The strain that could normally be seen from his stance was now gone, his arms left hanging as they held the spear shaft in a relaxed manner. To Blake’s surprise, the number of wounds on Howard’s body was decreasing, the open cuts and slashes closing up on its own accord. The blood that ran freely soon slowed to a crawl as the blood clotted over somehow.

Without excess movement and with amazing power, Howard swung the spear shaft downwards in a vertical swing, creating a powerful shockwave that sent even more undead flying, their bodies disappearing to a grey flash.

“Are you sure that you are level 35?” Blake asked as he shook his head in wonder. Naturally, from that distance, he didn’t get an answer.

******

The Elder smiled happily as he beheld the sight in the distance.

“He probably doesn’t realize this, but I guess it was a good first step.” the elder mused to himself, remembering the feral appearance Howard had taken previously while he was in that particular state.

“Now for the next step, but from here, it is all up to you now, young man.”

*******

I must have died. Please tell me I must have died. Please tell me that I had sustained a successful critical hit from one of the undead that were attacking me…

That was the first thought I had in my mind as I suddenly awoke. Strangely, I was not seated in the capsule where I would normally be while playing the game. This must mean one thing… I was still playing the game.

And since I wasn't forcibly logged out of the game, I must not have died, I thought grumpily to myself as I suddenly blinked, trying to get my bearings. Stupid undead, there were so many of them and they couldn't even kill a person properly…

Anyways, the environment had changed drastically from a bloody battlefield to somewhere… new.

Before my eyes were nothing but thick, dense fog that got everywhere, effectively covering everything and blocking out all vision. Looking down, I could just barely tell that I was hale and hearty, my body bereft of the many wounds that had covered me from head to toe earlier. It felt really good… but at the same time it was oddly disorienting. Who wouldn’t be if they were suddenly taken out of a battle and dumped here at God knows where?

Head spinning in confusion, I started to walk in a random direction, calling out at the top of my lungs:

“Is there anybody here? Does anyone know where I am?”

Maybe I would be able to find someone that would know this location… Or perhaps this is a holding spot for the vanquished until someone uses a resurrection spell or something. How would I know, this is the first time I had died, right? As I thought about this, another thought ran through my mind.

“Wait, what am I even walking on?” I looked down. Below me was nothing but fog, but the ground I’m standing on seemed solid. I must surely be standing on clouds, right? Shouldn’t it be soft and fluffy to the touch? It can’t be that I’m on terra firma, right?

“Sigh. No sense thinking about this now…”

Having gone through these questions with no satisfactory answer to any of them, I shrugged to myself and kept moving forward.

As I kept walking, the fog cleared a little, revealing a path that gleamed gold. It was still hard to see, but I could barely make out the path that stretched out in the distance, the gold path somehow shining in the thick fog.

Perhaps if I keep walking on this path, I would find a way out of this crazy place, I thought to myself as I can only keep moving forward, the many questions I had on my mind left unanswered.

*********