We walk toward the castle and I have to reassess my statement. Enormous doesn’t describe how huge it is. As we walk, I can’t help but marvel at the surroundings. The air feels dense and charged up. I look toward Dante and can see he feels it as well.
“Up ahead, same ones as last time. There’s 2 level 5s and one 6,” I hear from my side. I look over to see Dante getting his shortsword out and gaze at the direction he’s facing. I notice 3 hounds running over at us.
2 runs at Dante and one to me. Is this sizism? I'm going toward him because he’s bigger. Huhu. I see how it is. I grip my shortsword like it’s a dagger and dash toward the two beasts running at Dante. As I near the two beasts, I slide under one of them gripping my hands around its body, turning and jumping to sit on it.
It collapses under my weight and I hear bones cracking. I plunge my dagger into its neck and hear a ding. Getting up, I leave the other beast to Dante and turn toward my original beast. It runs at me and I can’t help but smile. Let’s experiment a bit.
I let it bite my thigh, making sure to angle the bite so it doesn’t hit anything vital. Feeling it clamp on, I stifle a groan and stab it into its neck. I feel its hold on my thigh loosen and hear another ding.
Looking back I see Dante ripping open the jaw of his beast, killing it instantly. I fall back and lay in the pool of blood coming from the deranged hound. I open my notifications to see how many levels I gained.
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You have killed Regent’s Hound - F rank - Level 6 x1
You have killed Regent’s Hound - F rank - Level 5 x1
You have levelled up x2
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I drop one point at a time into the constitution and slowly feel my regeneration pick up. After the second point, I notice the bleeding stop.
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Status
Age: 16
Name: Elijah Ashborne
Level: 6
Affinity: Shadow
Strength: 8
Agility: 9
Constitution: 16
Mind: 13
Mana: 0
Primary Artifact: None
Secondary Artifact/s: None
[Stat Points: 0]
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Level 6 already. Levelling up is really easy in the beginning, isn’t it?
“I’m level 6, what about you? What level are you,” I ask him.
“4,” he exclaims back, his attention on the air, or rather on the invisible screen in front of him.
I nod my head and start cutting my kills to look into their chest. I pull out two tiny essence stones and sigh. I see Dante is done with his and he shows me his essence stone before putting it into his backpack. I follow his lead, showing him mine and we wordlessly start walking again toward the castle.
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
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We encountered two more groups of hounds on the way to the castle. I levelled 3 more times and decided to save my stat points because why not? We reach the front door and I can’t help but curse my luck. I didn’t get any artifacts from any of the beasts here, while that lucky bastard, Dante, got two. The inspect ring and some fire whip. The whip is barely stronger than a normal one, but it’s the honour of the matter. I send him a deathly glare and see him touch the back of his neck.
As we approach the gates to the castle, they creak open sending a loud echo throughout our surroundings. We send each other a look and simultaneously turn around.
“We’re not walking away from the gates because we’re scared. We’re walking away because, you know, it’s nighttime,” I exclaim.
“It’s nighttime?” he looks up at the sky and back at me, “There’s no sun. I don’t think the concept of night or day works here.”
I stare at the idiot. I was being sarcastic, you dense fool. Ignoring him, I go to set up camp.
Now, how do I do this? Taking a small box out of my backpack, I lay it out and look for a button or anything to indicate how to use it. I find a small bump on the side, pressing it, I hear a mechanism and the box starts to open up. It unfolds into a tent in less than a minute. I open the zipper into the tent and crawl in. It isn’t the biggest, but it really is convenient. I take out my sleeping bag and set it up. I take some dry food and water from my bag and walk to Dante’s tent.
I stand in front of his tent and call out to him.
“Dante, can I come in,” I call out to him. I hear him say yes from inside the tent and I crawl in and see him looking closely at a ring in his hand.
“Heyyyy Dante, nice tent, where’d you get it? I wish I had one,” Used to my annoying and stupid remarks, he ignores me and continues to fiddle with the ring in his hand. I wait for him to get done.
I touch his hand stopping his fiddling and see him look up at me, frowning.
“We should plan what we’re going to do from now on and one of us has to be on watch at all times,” I comment and then get up to go outside.
I hear Dante follow me and we both sit in front of our tents, eating and enjoying the moment.
“You stink and your clothes have so many holes and scratches,” He points out breaking the silence.
I look down and notice how bad my clothes are. I shrug my shoulders and point back at him, trying to convey that he isn’t in a better state than me.
“How do we want to do this?” I tell him, “All the monsters aren’t nearly as bad as I thought it would be. Especially considering that this place is a coloured portal. We can probably clear it or do you just want to get the return stone and go home”
“We should get the stone, Get to level 25 and leave. This place gives me the creeps” he takes a moment to fix his hair and continues, “What level are you?”
“9,” I let him know.
“I’m level 11 now. Having an artifact is a big help in killing these monsters,” He tells me.
“Don’t rub it in,” I sigh, not having the energy to make any caustic remarks, “Anyway, what’s someone like you doing in the small town we lived in? You are a noble even though you try to hide it.”
“It’s personal,” He looks into the air reminiscing before adding, “You’re not one to talk. What were you doing living in the mountains until a couple of months ago along with that Raven kid? Even when you were forced down and to come to school, you ignored everyone who tried to speak to you.”
“It’s personal,” I say back in a mocking tone.
Feeling the need to think, I tell him to sleep and that I will take the first watch.
My thoughts run rampant now that I’m alone, I think about what the coloured portal meant. We were taught about a red portal, which is when the portal ranks up. And a blue portal means that there’s only a single humanoid monster inside with immense strength. Right now, none of those fit what we’re facing.
I sit and think about what I need to do next. I feel a tap on my shoulder and see Dante.
“It’s been 5 hours, you go and sleep,” he whispers.
Heading into the tent, I fall asleep the second my head hits the pillow.
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I awake to the sounds of fighting. Jumping up, I pick up my sword and walk out of the tent. I watch as Dante holds off a crowd of hounds. Analyzing the situation, I look for an opening to join in. I see Dante wrap his whip around one of the hound’s heads and rip it off. He continues to fight and seems to have the situation handled. He’s gotten so much stronger. Damn, I’m falling behind.
I find an opening and take it. I start killing the beasts and can’t help but think that, They were so difficult to kill not so long ago, yet now that we are facing over 40 of them, they’re nothing but play toys. I cut off the feet of one of the hounds and stabbed the other. I see one of them jump at my head. I duck and dodge it. I run up to it and slide under it cutting its’s stomach open. I feel its warm organs run over my body and continue to fight.
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I fall over and crawl to Dante who’s fallen unconscious from exertion. We finished killing all the Hound monsters. Panting, I look at my notification.