It had been just about two months since Damien finished the tutorial and arrived in the multiverse of Lautum. After spending ten years grinding his way up the tower and finding all the hidden bosses, he had high expectations for this vast new world. But he had been immediately disappointed when he finally exited the tutorial. Because everything here was so weak.
Damien had been searching for a challenge to fulfill him— having outleveled everything in the tutorial years before he finally finished it. Except, when he exited the tutorial, he had found himself in the weakest world in the multiverse of Lautum.
It was called Extim, and it was a complete disappointment to Damien.
So his goal had only been to leave Extim— to ascend up to one of the Six Heavens of Lautum. Or at the very least, that had been his goal at first. Until he learned more about Extim, Lautum, and the Overlords that ruled the System.
Until he formed a… family?
It had happened through pure chance. After defeating the final boss of the tutorial, Damien had acquired a strange black egg that didn’t hatch until he encountered Lena— a legendary Leviathan with a… personality.
He had simply wanted to use the egg as a lure for the Overlords at first. For the chance to have a real fight at his hands. To challenge himself. But he slowly grew fond of this family he formed.
He slowly learned to care for Aria, the little demon girl born from the egg.
And that was when Damien had finally been given the opportunity he had been searching for the entire time. To challenge himself against a powerful enemy. But the caveat was that they… had hurt his family.
They had come after Aria, nearly killing Lena in the process.
Which threw Damien into a rage that he hadn’t felt before. In that moment, he did not care about the gratification that came from overcoming a tough obstacle. All he wanted was to kill these Inquisitors who came after his family.
And after a difficult battle, he finally emerged victorious. He finally leveled up for the first time in years— twice!
However, he had also gotten himself injured during that battle— quite badly at that. And he had already exhausted all of his Potions of Regenerations. So the fight had rendered him incapacitated for about the better part of a week, before he finally recovered.
And now that he was finally healed up…
Damien started down to the base of the mountain as he took in the forest spreading out around him. He breathed in deeply, before spreading his arms wide.
“The fresh smell of battle… I missed this…” he whispered to himself.
He could still see some of the effects of the battle between him, Lena, Aria, and the Inquisitors scarring the landscape all around him. While he had been enraged by what the Inquisitors— especially Bronz— had done back then, he was now sort of glad it happened. Because firstly, Lena and Aria survived. But secondly, he had leveled up twice and gotten a few new Skills.
Status:
Name: Damien Thorne
Class: [Legendary Brawler - Level 619]
Titles: [Immortalslayer] [The Boss Killer], [Explorer of the New World], [Death Defier], [Monster Hunter], [Master of Martial Arts], [Sage Mage], [Aura Champion], [Coward]
Stats:
[Strength: 1260 (+100) (+100) (+10) (+30) (+25) (+25)]
[Magic: 733 (+100) (+100) (+10) (+20) (+50) (+30)]
[Speed: 1089 (+100) (+100) (+10) (+50) (+25) (+50)]
If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.
[Vitality: 689 (+100) (+100) (+10) (+50) (+25) (+25)]
Skills: [Vengeance Fist], [Supernova Strike], [Nebular Punch], [Soulcrusher], [Rage Unleashed], [Aura Creation], [Greater Haste], [Instant Strike], [A Hundred Blows], [Basic Slash], [Disengage], [Jump Over Mountains], [Wind Leap], [Object Appraisal], [Eagle Eye]
Passive Skills: [Ultimate Instinct], [Unbreakable Skin], [Heavenly Bones], [Soul Mastery], [Aura Unleashed], [Greater Durability], [Greater Speed], [Greater Strength], [Indomitable Spirit], [Second Life], [Heightened Senses]
“[Vengeance Fist], [Ultimate Instinct], and [Rage Unleashed]...” Damien read out his brand new Skills and upgraded Skills as he stared at the blue box showing his Status before him. “I can finally test them out. First—”
Damien stepped forward as he focused on [Ultimate Instinct]. It was a Passive Skill, which meant that it didn’t exactly need to be activated to be used. However, he knew what the Skill could do previously before it had been upgraded.
It had been called [Super Instinct] beforehand. It allowed him to anticipate attacks before they even happened. It was almost like precognition. Except, it was more like reading the body language of his enemies.
Leaping forward, Damien landed right before a group of horned wolves. He had spotted them hurrying through the trees in the distance, and he simply wanted to draw their ire. Which his presence did.
Immediately, the leader of the wolfpack growled and pounced at him. Damien hadn’t even intended to react. He had wanted to analyze what his [Ultimate Instinct] would drive him to do.
But his body moved instinctively and grabbed the wolf before it could reach him. Blinking, Damien stared at the yelping monster as it writhed in his grasps. The rest of the pack growled and charged at him.
However, Damien’s body instinctively dodged their flurry of attacks. He placed a hand on his chin as he casually ducked under a claw and stepped away from a snapping mouth.
“Huh, so it’s like an automatic defense mode,” Damien muttered to himself. “Interesting.”
Damien tossed the alpha of the pack aside, before he leapt into the air. He soared high above the clouds as the world almost seemed to disappear below him. He inhaled deeply and looked up to the sky with a grin.
“Now, next up is—”
Damien’s eyes flickered as his mind focused on the brand new Skill he had been given. [Vengeance Fist]. He had expected it to be incredibly powerful, and he didn’t want to cause too much damage to his surroundings. Especially since Lena and Aria were in the area.
That was why he waited until he was far from the ground to use it. And when he did, he aimed at the sky.
“[Vengeance Fist].”
Damien swung out with a grin. He had expected the Skill to be equal or superior to even his [Supernova Strike]— which was his previous strongest Skill. He thought the sheer impact of [Vengeance Fist] would dissipate all the clouds within the area.
He thought it would send a shockwave blasting out that would even uproot the trees far below.
But as Damien threw his fist forward—
He could only blink as a small puff of smoke shot forward, before disappearing entirely.
There was no localized hurricane. No earthquake. The sky didn’t split open from the force of the attack. The Skill almost seemed to do… nothing special.
Damien just stared at his fist as he slowly tumbled back towards the ground.
“What was that?” he asked himself.
But he couldn’t use the Skill again right now. Not until its cooldown came to an end.
He frowned as he quickly approached the base of the mountain once more. And right before he crashed down, he flipped in the air and landed lightly on his feet.
Damien studied his fist as he scrunched up his brows. “What went wrong? Did I do it wrong?”
He questioned himself for a moment. But he came up with no answers. He was planning on waiting for the cooldown to end before trying it again to analyze what went wrong.
However, a voice called out to him.
“Papa!”
Glancing to the side, Damien watched as Aria and Lena approached him. The little demon girl dashed to his side as she tugged at his hand.
“Can we go now? I really want to visit the human city already! Please?”
“But I haven’t even tried out [Rage—” Damien started.
And Lena huffed, crossing her arms. “Aria has been waiting for you for a week to visit the human city. Come on, you don’t want to make her wait any longer, do you?”
The Leviathan was in her human form, using the Ring of Transformation to disguise herself for the trip to the city. Damien glanced between the two of them, before he smiled.
“Fine. I guess testing out my Skills can wait a little longer.”
Especially since I’d prefer not to use [Rage Unleashed] around either of you, if it works anything like [Berserk Mode]. Also, figuring out what went wrong with [Vengeance Fist] will probably take a while.
Damien internally added the second bit as he picked up Aria. She cheered, and he looked towards the Leviathan-transformed-human.
“Let’s get going then,” Damien said as he offered a hand to Lena as well. “To Verne.”
There was something he needed to check with there anyways. Lena nodded to him and took his hand. Before he took off into the air, flying across the landscape with the both of them in tow.