At 0600, Michael was already back in front of the large office building. The sun was up, but was obscured by buildings to the east of him. He had 25 out of 30 of the bolts on his bracer, giving him more leeway than the day before. With 5 additional points in strength, he should be able to smash enemies aside a lot easier. He had to be successful today.

Hopefully his hypothesis that the green drop would be in the basement proved to be right. He would hate to have to fight through any more floors of the building than he had to. If he ran out of bolts he might have to back off for his safety once again. He could not continue to linger in the area, nor could he lose out on other potential drops while struggling day after day for this one.

Michael might not leave till he got it, but if he had to spend another 3 or 4 days here, he would lose a lot of time to cover more ground and potentially find other good drops. The ghouls seemed to have an excellent drop rate, but going through them also sapped several times more effort.

Michael only gingerly glanced around after entering through the front doors. He quickly noted that the ghoul bodies were gone. Only gore smudges existed there now. He was not exactly surprised. Any time he left an area with dead enemies, their bodies would disappear. Either it was a battle function, or other zombies and ghouls were having themselves a pre-contender appetizer.

“Here's to hoping a bunch of ghouls don’t come down stairs after me,” Michael said, taking the first step. As far as he knew the stairs and elevator shoots were the only way down and back up. The ghouls had proven to be quite wily, so it would not surprise him if some came down after him trapping him down there. There was no good dwelling on it. Not as if he could afford the time to clear all five above ground stories.

Michael reached the first landing and moved around the staircase. The next flight had a good five more steps than the previous one. Michael crept down them one at a time. The landing was still fairly well illuminated, but each step down cut the available light seemingly in half. The room at the bottom was not completely dark. There were a couple forever light ‘EXIT’ signs that ran off of some sort of chemical reaction. It made sense. At this point they had to give some sort of light, to make contenders going for the green drop even feasible.

If it was completely pitch black down here, he might have to turn around. Thankfully there was just enough light to attempt things. Michael paused midway down, to scour the room. The basement room ended with a wall 30 feet away. A single door led to whatever was beyond. The room seemed clear, just a few pieces of furniture, but Michael remained skeptical.

Some contenders might be fixated on what was ahead of them, but there was one clear area for ghouls to lurk. Michael quickly distanced himself a couple steps from the stairs before looking what might be underneath. Truth was all he saw was pure blackness, but the ghouls lurking within had decided that the gig was up. They launched themselves out from the dark. “Wraaaaaaaaaagghhhh.”

Micheal bashed the first ghoul away, and knocked the second one back with a backswing. A couple more swings and the three ghouls were finished. Five more stats had really taken his strength to new heights. A golden coin streaked into his chest. It brought his total in battle wealth up to 60 crowns.

Michael continued forward. The door had a rectangle sign that simply said caution, hearing protection required. Michael turned the knob and pushed. The door swung in revealing what appeared to be a boiler room.

The room was narrow, perhaps 30 feet in width, with 3 walkways. More forever signs with various words like caution or warning were interspaced throughout the room leaving just enough light for Michael to get the gist of the room. A line of tanks, or boilers, separated the center walkway from both sides. The floor was made of metal grates alluding that this was just the top half of the room. Each of the boiler tanks stretched some 15 feet below to the floor below. Similarly the ceiling stretched 15 feet above.

A dozen tanks seemed a bit much for heating water or warming the building, whatever they were for, but it was not like they were actually running. The creators did not have to make everything realistic when there was no functional requirement. The room was dead silent, with potentially ghouls lurking in every shadow. He needed to find a flashlight.

Michael sighed before stepping cautiously out on the metal grate. His foot falls were not extremely loud, but if ghouls tried to move on the walkways, he would most definitely hear them. He inched forward bat at the ready, choosing the center after getting a better look. The two side paths both led to a ladder that would take him to the bottom of the room, but he would at least try to clear the top first if he could. At least this way he would stand a chance of escaping the room. Not that escape seemed like a likely prospect. He felt adrenaline amping up his body for the fight that was sure to come.

Michael cleared the shadow in between the first set of boilers on both sides, and continued forward. It was extremely dark, but the ghouls actually did not seem to have many places to hide. The second gap was clear, as was the third and fourth. Nearing the end, Michael could not help but to wonder where the things would make their move. There appeared to be a set of stairs, leading down, at the end of this path. And was that a green glow?

Michael’s heart jumped. On the bottom floor behind the final boiler on the right, there was a dim green glow. While it could be another of those forever signs, his intuition said it was what he came for.

Michael stepped forward to clear the final gap. The metal to both sides groaned and he shifted his weight back immediately as he looked around, but the room was once again deathly silent. Michael kneeled down to look at the walkway. Had something gnawed on the flooring on both sides? Only slivers of metal were holding the next five foot section of flooring up. Had he fully put his weight on the section it would have likely instantly collapsed sending him down to what he could only presume was a moshpit of ghouls. Had the creatures set a trap? Unbelievable, the encyclopedia had said that ghouls were intelligent, but setting a trap?

They had weakened the section right after the green glow became visible. Dangling something tantalizing to encourage a little less caution for the next few steps. Michael searched ahead. The next section of the pathway seemed to be just fine. It was only about five feet away, so he could easily jump it, or return to either of the ladders near the entrance to the room. Jumping seemed a bit risky. He was pretty sure the next section would hold, but jumping would be fully committing himself. The ladders might not be the best way to get out of the room, but going down would not be as dangerous.

Michael turned to head back. Something slammed into the walkway behind him at the same moment. A seven foot monstrosity, whose arm was already blurring toward him. Michael’s body moved back instinctually to avoid the clawed hand, but the claws were still carved into his side. Michael felt the paralysis surge through his body, causing him to fall backward onto the walkway. The damaged section groaned but held.

Michael’s body was spasming as his muscles seized and relaxed. He had seemingly lost control of his body, and could do nothing but stare up at his attacker. Standing above him was a tall bald, pale skinned being. Just like the ghouls, the creature’s long fingers ended in claws. A forked tongue more than a foot in length waved back and forth like it was testing the air. The muscular frame of the body was only covered by a pair of tattered pants. The creature roared in challenge, “Wraaaaaaaaaagghhhh,” and he stepped forward to finish Michael off.

‘Phhhhtt,’ ‘Phhhhtt,’ ‘Phhhht,’ ‘Phhhht,’ four bolts launched from his bracer. Michael’s body was twitching as his muscles alternated from seizing in relaxation. It took all his concentration to shift his body to point his left arm in the creature’s general direction. The bolts streaked forward hitting the creature in the torso. The fifth and sixth shots went wild as the creature reared back.

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Michael heard the metal grown under his body as it started to give. The spasms ended right before the section of the walkway gave. His top half swung down, pivoting from his waist. His lower half not having landed on the damaged section was probably the only reason that it had not collapsed immediately when he had fallen backwards. It also imparted the rotation allowing him to do a full turn in the air, which kept Michael from falling head first or onto his back.

Michael had somewhat regained control of his body, after 5 seconds of paralysis. He did his best to land well. His feet hit first, sending a sharp pain that went totally ignored since his back hit next, as he allowed his body to collapse. The force knocked the air from him. It had not been a great landing, but it could have been far worse. Michael’s body still twitched a bit. After effects from the bout of paralysis, and his left ankle was definitely hurt. He did not think it was broken, but definitely at least sprained.

Now on the darker bottom floor, Michael could actually see pretty well what was above him. The tall white figure stood at the edge looking down at him. It’s tongue lashing out from between its sharp teeth. More alarming were the other smaller humanoid figures lowering themselves down from the roof. Slinking down the walls or down the sides of the tanks. Michael analyzed them.

[Ghast, Tier 1]

[Ghouls, Tier 1, x 3, Tier 0 x 8]

The pale muscular creature was obviously the ghast, but it was not the only threat. There were at least 3 tier 1 ghouls in the mix as well, and the 11 ghouls were only the ones that were in his line of sight.

Michael scrambled to his feet. The bat was gone, lost in the darkness, so he pulled one of the pipe wrenches out of his inventory. The weapon was as heavy as the bat, but he had a foot less reach with it. It was uncomfortable in his grip, but he did not have time to look for his bat. Several ghouls had either already reached the lower floor or had been hiding in the darkness on the far side of the room. They were on him in seconds. Michael’s left ankle hurt like hell, but it would hold. The adrenaline pumping through his veins pushed it to the far corners of his mind.

The ghast stood and watched as all of the rest swarmed the human below. Michael easily brained the first. The second ghoul caught his wrench in his hands, a tier 1. Michael twisted his left wrist to fire the bolts. Tier 1 or not the ghoul went down with one shot up and through the creature’s cheek and into its brain. A white drop appeared, but Michael could hardly worry about such things at this point. He was in full survival mode. Several more ghouls went down easily before a claw raked down his back.

Michael fell forward, muscles seizing briefly, but slamming face first into the pavement cleared him up. He rolled onto his back and shot the ghoul in the forehead. The tier 0 landed on top of him, but was easily pushed aside. A gold coin appeared pretty much on top of him, before dipping down into him. By the time Michael got to his feet he was already under attack by the first of the ghouls to have reached the floor by sliding down the sides of the tank.

Michael easily crushed into the skulls of the first two. The third was tier 1. If he had time he would have noticed that it was more muscular than the 0’s, but the clear indicator for Michael was when the creature took a full power strike to the head shot and only seemed a little dazed. Michael immediately switched to using his bracer. The first shot went wide as they both moved, but the second hit its mark. Three more crowns streaked into him.

Michael had already turned away to deal with the next threat. If he got paralyzed again he was likely done, so Michael went into crowd control mode. Three more ghouls closed in on him. They would reach him around the same time. Michael took the three down with only 4 shots. Another one rushed in from the side, Michael bashed its head in.

Two more came in, causing Michael to expend 5 shots. Michael knew he was running low on bolts. He had lost track of how many shots he had taken, but out of the corner of his eye he noted that there were a handful left. Also out of the corner of his eye was the ghast, who had jumped the gap in the walkway above and was heading down the stairs.

There were only two more ghouls left that Michael could see. He had to finish them off before the ghast got here. The first casually blocked his strike. Michael immediately resorted to firing bolts. It took two to knock it down. Another white ball appeared. The last ghoul went down fairly easily.

Michael had just enough time to check his wrist before the ghast was upon him. He had three bolts left. Michael met the creature with his wrench, but the weapon did nothing to stop the creature’s momentum. It slammed into him. Michael was sent flying, and the ghast staggered the opposite direction a step or two.

Michael had not been cut by the attack so there was no paralysis, but his whole body had been shaken by the slam. Michael sent both of his remaining shots the ghast's way. The first went inches wide. The second slammed into the ghast’s forearm, which it had raised in defense. His bracer was done, unless he was willing to lose the item.

The creature’s forearms were still before its face held in defense, so it lost a second of reaction time when Michael charged instead of firing more bolts. Michael brought his wrench down, but the ghast managed to catch the blow on its uninjured forearm. Bone snapped, but the ghast seemed unaffected. It directed swipe after swipe in Michael’s direction.

Michael retreated and knocked some away. His last blow had likely only snapped one of the two main bones in the creature’s forearm. The creature was by far the toughest opponent that he had faced. However it was perhaps a touch slower. Michael was able to find a gap in between the ghast’s attacks. He delivered a power strike to the creature’s ribs. A rib or two snapped from the blow.

A second later, Michael was once again on the back foot, doing everything to keep those paralytic claws from meeting flesh. The creature was guarding its head too well, so Michael waited for another opening before delivering another strike to the side. More ribs snapped, but the ghast had apparently expected Michael’s counter and sent a clawed hand right at his face.

Michael fell backwards. He landed hard a second before the ghast pounced. Michael brought up his feet catching the creature on its torso, before he thrusted the creature back. It worked, however a claw raked across his calf as the ghast flew backwards. Michael’s body went through another round of his muscles spasming uncontrollably. The ghast landed on its side and rolled onto its feet. It had to take a second to regain its bearings, which allowed Michael just enough time to recover.

The ghast with a broken arm and quite a few cracked ribs was not moving as fast and was definitely struggling, but Michael was also in pretty bad shape. After seeing that Michael had recovered and had stood back up, the ghast froze a minute sizing him up. Michael took a moment to check his wrist again. Nope, still just one.

The one bolt he had left could potentially easily end the fight, but Michael was determined not to use it. Not unless he absolutely had to. Despite the seriousness of what was before him, he chided himself for not waiting for a more opportune time before firing the two bolts earlier. Thinking about it would not help him now, he needed to think of something that he could do.

A second later he had it. Nearly at the same moment the ghast had shifted its weight. The creature had come up with its own plan. It dropped to all four and ran forward like an animal. It popped up, arms spread wide for a tackle. Michael was already diving aside. He could have delivered a powerful swing, but if it did not kill him then he was likely done for. He could not afford to be paralyzed again. The problem was, Michael did not think he could kill the ghast in one swing. Not unless he could get a full power strike to its head, but with its height, speed, and reactions, Michael had found it difficult and started targeting the creature’s torso.

Michael rolled to the side and back to his feet. The ghast was already coming his way. Michael slammed the wrench up, knocking the bigger creature back. The next thing the ghast knew a wrench was flying at its head. It raised its arms instinctually. The wrench hit hard, but hardly enough to do damage to such a tough creature. However, the newly summoned wrench in Michael’s hands slammed into its side. Michael brought his wrench back again and again.

The ghast was unable to do anything but defend due to the damage and the frequency of Michael’s blows. Michael was in control of the flow of battle. He had not idea how many blows he dealt, but eventually the creature’s battered arms raised in defense fell limply at its side. Michael had not hit the ghast in the head, but enough damage to the torso seemed to do the trick as well. For good measure, he slammed the wrench down on the ghast’s head a couple of times.

A golden ball formed over its body, an amber drop, but Michael was just struggling to catch his breath. His SP had nearly bottomed out dipping all the way down to 7 SP. Likely it had been well above halfway full when he had started the fight with the ghast, meaning that he had spent that much effort on just this one enemy.

His health was down to 83 HP. He had several gashes, but without a bleeding status they were not too much of a concern. His ankle that now seemed to be screaming at him was more of an issue. An injury on a leg during something like this was always a big detriment.