Shaun had just finished off the 14th wave, he was definitely more exhausted than he had been earlier and he had resorted to no longer using his own mana and instead relying on the gauntlet and physical attacks, needing to recover as much as he could before the 15th wave. He had tried to trap one of the wolves but it was an impossible task, he tried to stun one and even knock it unconscious so he could recover, but he either always killed it or it would continuously fight back. The others left, as expected, on the 12th wave, unable to continue to fight without real risk of dying involved but he stayed and kept fighting, wanting to really push himself forward. He wanted to see what the boss of the 15th wave would be like, that and he was so close to another level he could feel it.

*Wave 15 Commencing*

The moment the wolves appeared, now 20 in total, he knew he was in trouble, the standard wolves he thought he could handle, even at level 39 they could be killed with time and effort, but the boss was something else entirely. Standing just a bit taller than the others, it didn’t look that much different, but when he identified it the differences became clear.

*Shifting Alpha Wolf – Level 40*

It was an alpha wolf, but that wasn’t what put him off, it was the shifting part that made him second guess the wolf, did it shift itself into something else or did it imply something different? The wolves didn’t waste any time in coming for him, the alpha at the lead of the pack. Shaun had been powering up a lightning bolt from the very start, knowing that he needed to kill it before it showed its true power. He let his attack fly, directly at the boss, but where he expected it to get hit, or even to try and dodge, it just completely disappeared. What the hell!

The bolt of lightning he had sent at the alpha wolf ended up hitting the middle of the pack, killing some of the wolves outright and hurting others quite severely, but that hadn’t been what he wanted, he had wanted to kill the alpha. He kept sending bursts of his echo into the dungeon, trying to figure out where it had gone but it was as if the beast had completely disappeared. The wolves started closing the remaining distance to him and he had no choice but to fight them, just as he had powered a lightning strike through his sword he felt something shift behind him but before he could even turn around he was sent flying through the air.

He hadn’t been prepared for the attack, he wasn’t even sure how he had been hit, but the alpha was standing right where he had been, blood now coating the paw it used to strike him. Shaun got himself off the ground, his ribs hurting from the attack, blood leaking from his side, but he didn’t have time to heal them as the wolves had changed direction and were coming directly for him. He refused to waste another lightning strike on the alpha so decided to clear out the other wolves first.

He had to be careful of his mana usage, but not enough that he couldn't use a few lightning strikes to reduce the number of wolves that were after him. He quickly powered up another attack before the wolves were on him and sent it straight into the middle of the group, followed shortly by a fire strike from his gauntlet. Just as the wolves were upon him he went in with his sword at the ready for some powered up lightning strikes. He only managed to hit two wolves before he felt the same shift as last time, but was again too late to get out of the way.

This time rather than be knocked across the dungeon he felt the alphas claws rip through his back, he couldn’t avoid its attack but he didn’t plan on letting it go without some payback. Whirling around his focused on striking it with his sword, imbued with another elemental strike, but when he turned the wolf was gone. This is getting fucking ridiculous!

His attack still imbued in his sword he dodged another of the wolves, pain searing through his back where the alpha had attacked him, and then launched the strike at another of the wolves. Getting a look at how many were left he still saw 13 of the dire wolves alive, better than 19 but still too many to deal with as well as the alphas shifting attacks. With the alpha capable of disappearing and then appearing in another spot, he had come to the conclusion that this shifting alpha was actually shifting through space, he didn’t know how but it was so overpowered that it just wasn’t fair.

He continued fighting against the wolves, his mana going down with each attack, he hadn’t had much to begin with so what he was now wasting on fighting these dire wolves was mana wasted on what he should be using on the boss. After every few attacks the alpha would make an appearance and attack him, he had started to get a feel for when it would appear, the area around where it would strike next shifted just moments before it would arrive, and that had started to give him some notice so he would be able to move out of the way, not enough for an attack though, not yet, he was still fighting against all the other monsters which were taking a lot of his concentration.

What had started as 19 of the wolves had now dropped down to 5, and with that he had accrued more wounds than he could heal without being left alone for a few minutes to purely concentrate on fixing himself. He had started to slow down as well, but thankfully so had the attacks from the alpha, it seemed that the wolf could only shift so often and so quickly which gave him time to continue to whittle down the number of other wolves.

Before he was able to finish off the remaining wolves the alpha joined in the fight, this time though when it appeared attacking him from the side, Shaun had been able to use the moments notice to launch himself to the side and narrowly miss the attack. Rolling into the ground he quickly stood up and took in the alpha. It hadn’t disappeared again, like every other attack, instead it turned around and came right back at him, giving him an opportunity to do some damage. He had enough mana for two more attacks, one from his own mana supply and one from the gauntlet, having practically drained the gem dry throughout the last few waves.

As the alpha came at him again, he dodged to the side and at the same time swept out with his sword, clipping it on the leg. He had assumed that the alpha was going to shift again so didn’t bother putting any mana into the attack, however it hadn’t, and that led him to believe it either decided that it would attack like the rest of the wolves and strike him when he least expected it or it was out of its own supply of mana and could no longer shift until it recovered.

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Not wanting to lose the slight chance that he was right, and that the wolf was now vulnerable, he sent a fire strike through his gauntlet into the centre of the dire wolves, depleting the remaining mana in the gem but accomplishing what he set out to do, distract them. At the same time he started powering up for one last lightning strike, ready to let it loose at the alpha, he started running directly at it, while at the same time it started running at him. When they met in the middle he didn’t dodge the attack and let the beast land on him, at the same time sending out the lightning strike, driving his sword straight in its chest.

The attack from the sword wasn’t enough to kill it but the blast of lightning that hit it was enough to electrocute it to the point where it wasn’t able to fully move, or get away from him. He pushed the alpha off of him, thankful that he hadn’t been too injured from the attack, just a few scratches on his chest. Before any of the other wolves could get close to him he pulled his sword from the alphas chest and stabbed it right through its head, killing it in an instant.

He was now out of mana, but he didn’t care, he would kill the remaining wolves with his sword, again wishing for a weapon that had more length to it. As soon as the wolves were on him he pushed himself to his limit, dodging between all of their attacks and doing damage where he could, slowly inflicting wounds onto each and every one of the monsters. When he managed a kill shot on one of them he felt the battle shift, he had one less wolf to worry about and allowed him a bit of breathing room. One of the wolves made a mistake and attempted to rush at him at the same time as another and he was able to cleanly dodge both, letting them hit each other instead of him, which he took advantage of and killed of another of the monsters, leaving him with only three to handle.

He knew that if it wasn’t for the recent boost in Dexterity that he would have had to give up on this fight a long time ago, but he had gained over 100 points due to his affinity and he used every single one of them to win the fight. By the time he was done he was exhausted and hurt and honestly just wanted to shower and lay down. But he knew that as soon as he finished the dungeon he wouldn’t have much time to clean up and get ready for the soiree, even though it was something he didn’t want to do. It wasn’t just going to be talking at the soiree, he was going to have to lie about his affinity, carefully navigate all of the factions that wanted to speak to him and try and not cause some political mess by saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. Because that’s what this all was, politics.

*Wave 15 Completed – Wave 16 starting in 1 minute*

*You have defeated a (Dire Wolf – Lvl 39). Bonus experience for killing an opponent above your level gained. 3800 TE awarded*

……………………………………………………………………………………..

*You have defeated a (Dire Wolf – Lvl 39). Bonus experience for killing an opponent above your level gained. 3800 TE awarded*

*You have defeated a (Shifting Alpha Wolf – Lvl 40). Bonus experience for killing an opponent above your level gained. 4000 TE awarded*

*Class: Elemental Blade Slinger has levelled up by +1 levels. [Advanced] Elemental Blade Slinger has reached Level 39. +3 Str, +2 Dex, +3 End, +3 Vit, +4 Soul gained*

He knew he was close to another level but seeing it always gave him a sense of achievement, that mixed in with all of the TE had gotten was worth the wounds. He estimated that from this dungeon run alone he had gotten over 400,000 TE, a huge amount, especially when he thought back to when he was working so hard just to get the 10,000 he needed in the first stage of the tutorial. He quickly looted the wolves, and the Alpha gave him something so odd that he wanted to take it straight out of his inventory to check it, it was called a Constricting Silver Heart and damn if it didn’t make him curious as to what exactly it did.

The next wave was about to begin and although he had no plans to fight through it he did want to know what he would be facing, just like last time, so he could prepare himself for what would be coming his way.

*Wave 16 Commencing*

He felt the 20 new monsters appear, but not with his sight, they were in the ground. That’s not a good sign. He couldn’t see them, but he could feel them with his echo, and they were coming right for him, directly up from the ground where he was standing. He quickly jumped out of the way just as the monster reached the surface. When he looked back at what had come up from the ground he saw a giant worm with rows of razor sharp teeth. Its body, from what he could see of it at least, was 3 metres long, and that was just from what had appeared before him, the entire thing had to have been much longer.

*Burrowing Earth Worm – Level 40*

He had gotten what he wanted and now it was time to leave, he could feel all of the other worms coming for him. I give up! As soon as he thought it he disappeared, no longer at the mercy of the worms. He appeared back in front of the dungeon at the same time as the others, they didn’t look great but he definitely looked worse. It seemed every time he exited one of the dungeons he came back with ruined clothing and covered in blood, but also stronger, always stronger.

“You look like shit. That bad huh?” Viv asked him.

“Yeah, that bad. The boss is a menace! I will tell you all about it later. I want to know what reward we got from the dungeon.”

*Calculating dungeon reward grade*

Wave 15 cleared. Adjusting reward grade.

Dungeon reward grade: D

*Distributing reward at D level*

*2 Silver coin*

*Tiranium Ore*

*[Advanced] Tiranium Ore: An ore that is commonly used to reinforce or create weapons and armour. It provides increased efficiency when inscribed with spells.*

D grade again, how is that fair! I literally went 5 waves higher than last time! When he looked at the message closer he noticed that he didn’t get the boost for going in alone. He also couldn’t be too upset, the metal was good. Looking at the others they all got the same, even though they only went to the 12th wave. If he managed to get the ore from everyone though he should have enough to craft something pretty cool.

Before any of them got a chance to do anything else they each felt their orbs start to light up and vibrate. He then felt a message appear in his mind, informing him that he had 30 minutes to get to the soiree, including directions on which signs to follow. He knew this was coming but he had hoped he had more time.

“We run, get ready and meet at the entrance to the soiree. No time to waste. Bye!” Viv ran as soon as she finished speaking, leaving the rest of them watching after her, it took only a second for them to share a look and do exactly the same. They couldn’t show up looking like they did, it would be insulting to all of those at the soiree, and the last thing that he could afford was to insult the reps.