The ogre was closing in slowly but surely towards who I now recognized as Alex from the tournament. She had backed up as much as possible, there was no room to go anywhere else, any potential avenues were blocked by piles of bodies and makeshift barricades.

Anyone else who could have helped was busy with their own fight or was to tired or weak to help, for them there is no point in risking their life when there is no chance for them to survive much less help someone else.

It was a selfish but realistic mindset which I could understand, but in this scenario I had the means to help and was close enough to do something about it before it was too late. Not to mention that I actually knew the person and got along with them, which for me practically counted as a best friend considering how few people I actually bothered to know or talk to.

Thinking quickly, I returned Brutus and sent out Jareth from his resting state in the core and had him go out and provide support to the bladed mantis. I then had Jotun and Myself barge towards the hulking blob of fat that was looking at Alex like a snack, with drool dribbling out of its' mouth and all.

Thinking that I would need to distract it in order to make it in time I stopped when I was within hearing range and began to taunt the monster, "Hey one-too-many-bigmacs I heard your mama was so ugly that she tried to enter an ugly contest but they said 'sorry, no professionals'". This seemed to catch the attention of the beast, and although it may have not been intelligent enough to understand what I was saying, the manner in which I was saying it made it apparent that I Wass making fun of it.

It didn't seem to care much for my taunt as it switched directions towards me and lifted a fist in preparation to punch me into next week. Deciding that this probably wasn't a hit I wanted to take even when hardening myself, I used my teleportation skill and moved about 2 feet to the right of the incoming fist and hightailed it out of there.

I began jogging over to Alex to check up on her while leaving Jotun to take care of the incensed ogre. The wyrmling seemed to be having a blast as he was much faster than the towering monster and was just taking chunks out of it with every swipe of his paws. The fat coating only prevented so much damage, but it eventually reaches a point where enough damage will wear it down until it is vulnerable.

Jotun had the advantage of causing at least 3 claw wounds with every swing and he could usually get in at least 2 swings before being forced to dodge. Eventually he had enough playing around and launched a piece of condensed-ice the size of a cannon ball to the head of the monster, and with it being so slow there was no chance to dodge. The moment of impact there was a crunching sound as the side of the head was severely dented, the brain damage was extensive enough to cease all brain function. Like a puppet with its' strings cut, the monster quickly fell to its knees and then face-planted into the ground with a resounding thud.

I got close enough to see her and her harpy in a defensive position in case the ogre veered towards them. I spoke to try and assuage their fears, "Those ogres won't be a problem anymore. Are you alright, what happened?" She seemed less weary after my assurance, but still remained on guard, which wasn't a bad idea on the battlefield.

She calmed down a bit more before answering, "I'm fine for now, just exhausted. We got ganged up on by those two ogres and my harpy Holly went to distract one while Musashi my bladed mantis fought the other one off. The problem is that sharp weapons didn't seem to do much to their thick hide. Musashi's blades bounced off for the most part or made small cuts, and Holly's talons weren't even long enough to get through the large fat exterior of the monster."

I looked behind me to see how my summons were fairing, Jotun had torn up the ogre and was already waiting around near the battle with the mantis and Jareth in case they needed any help. Jareth had already mostly recovered from the aftereffects of the potion and was providing more than ample support to Musashi.

His blunt hammers negated the thick-skin advantage of the ogre and did direct damage to flesh and organs, which was quickly wearing on it. The fight ended soon After Jareth joining and using the mantis to distract it while he did damage. He slammed his gravity hammer right into the side of the knee-cap on the ogre's left left, which completely hobbled it and it fell from the lack of support and extreme body weight.

It was easy pickings for the mantis and Jareth, it did its' best to fend off attacks, but with nowhere to got they situated themselves to the side and behind to attack from its' weak spots. Eventually it succumbed to a lucky strike at the neck from the mantis where the skin wasn't nearly as thick, and Jareth smashing in the back of the ogre's skull after it became distracted at the pain in its' neck.

Seeing that both monsters were taken care of I said to Alex, "Well, looks like they won't be a problem anymore. Since your mantis took care of the ogre for the most part why don't you get that ogre and I'll take the other body. It's starting to get dangerous on this field with monsters stronger than us like what happened just now, why don't we team up at least until the battle is over. Safety in numbers and all that." I'm not the greatest speaker or the most social of people, but I thought I was pretty convincing in my speech.

She nodded at my suggestion to split the bodies, but seemed to be thinking a lot longer about teaming up with someone she barely knows. But after a few seconds of contemplation she seems to have warmed up to it and says, "I'll agree to work together on one condition, any money made is split and we watch out for each other. If you abandon me and I survive, I'll hunt you down."

The end of her proposal scared me a bit, but was just fine with me as I never intended to abandon her, I absolutely believed her threat though, the hard look in her eyes said that she would cut me down without a second thought if I ever betrayed her. She seemed to have a guarded worldview similar to mine, and it looked as if those with poor childhoods like ours created adults focused on safety and survival with no allusions as to how cruel the real world is. After looking in her eyes to try and glean anything from her, I went up and shook her outstretched hand.

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"I think since Musashi and Jareth are familiar with each other they should pair up, and we can have my frost wyrm Jotun team up with Holly. They should complement their fighting styles fairly well." She just nodded her head and focused on her summons which I could only assume she was communicating with.

Once done with her mental talk, she faces me again and says, "Since we're going to be trusting each other with our lives why don't you call me Alexis, only strangers call me Alex. Also, there should only be about 5 minutes until the second phase is finished, we just need to hunker down and remain alive till then."

I couldn't agree more with her, and we do just that. Our summons battled together against increasingly stronger monsters until they all were eventually forced to face off against a minotaur. It was an 8 foot tall monstrosity with almost everything below the neck looking like an intimidating and tanned human with the occasional patch of hair, while the head was a brown fur clad bovine head clad with large scythe-like horns and had a thick golden ring through its' septum.

Each snort from it's nose produced noticeable gusts of wind, and it gripped its' double-headed axe tightly within both of its hands. The weapon was a scarred and bloody hunk of sharp metal attached to what looked like a weathered bone handle of some large beast.

"I don't think this muscle-brain is looking for an invitation to a tea party." I said nervously about the towering figure that was stomping its' legs through the dirt in preparation for charging right at us. It's hooves made deep crevices into the blood-stained field and bellowed out a war-cry before charging at me and Alexis with axe at the ready in front of it.

Our summons were too far away to intercept the minotaur that had appeared right after they had finished taking care of some hellhounds that breathed out black hell-fire every chance they got. Each team had taken on one of the fire-spewing hounds and were farther away from their summoners than was safe when the minotaur showed up.

Minotaurs were in the middle of the tier 4 category, they were impressively strong monsters that wielded two-handed axes and hammers to crush any foes. They had average defense and were only capable of physical skills, but they were extremely strong and capable fighters.

He rushed closer and closer, picking up speed as he went. By the time he was only a few feet in front of us I grabbed onto Alexis and told her to hold on. She didn't understand what I was doing and seemed only capable of watching what she thought was our impending doom.

I didn't know if my teleportation would work with an extra passenger, but figured that it wouldn't hurt to try. I looked to the immediate left of our position just out of range of the stampeding humanoid bull and activated my skill after securing her within my arms.

I felt the odd sense of displacement and slight disorientation and luckily still felt Alexis within my arms. Since we were still alive, my skill must have worked and with a passenger no less, although it seemed the range was half the normal amount on account of having an extra person traveling with me.

I looked to our right and witnessed the charging minotaur rush right past where we had previously been with its' head aimed down and jet-black horns ready to impale us. It had too much momentum to stop the charge immediately, but did its' best to stop after realizing his targets had somehow evaded.

My teleportation was on cool down for another five minutes, but luckily I wouldn't need it as Jotun and the rest of the summons moved in on our position to get between the monster and us. Alexis seemed stunned at the sudden teleportation and remained within my arms as our summons rushed to protect us.

I let her go and readied my sword in case any other monsters showed up as I wouldn't be able to easily escape them. I roared over to my still stunned teammate who had seen her life rush before her eyes, "Get your head back in the game! We have a monster to kill and we're still in danger, so don't let your guard down." This seemed to shake her out of her fugue state, she looked towards the battle that was about to start between our 4 summons and the hulking beast.

We each gave orders to our respective summons and hoped for the best while attempting to remain incognito behind a barricade while the battle resumed, it would do no one any good for us to remain vulnerable. We were too weak to have an effect on the monster, and at most we could provide orders or suggestions during the fight.

Jareth and Jotun rush in to prevent the minotaur from gaining any momentum, Holly and Musashi were sneaking in attacks from the air and the monster's back respectively. Being attacked from all sides, the minotaur was hard-pressed to defend itself.

Jotun unleashed an ice-ball attack at the minotaurs right shoulder, which upon impact broke the shoulder bone and dislocated it so that the axe was forcefully released from its' grip. Holly rushed in and mauled its' eyes and face while trying to avoid the horns, the pain caused the monster to roar out in pain and shake its head to try and ward off any further attacks.

Unfortunately, the horns on its' head were rather large and managed to nick the harpy and throw her away onto the ground, nothing was broken but she was out of the fight for now after that hard jolt and fall. Musashi was still rather tired, but persevered and cut swathes through the sizable muscles on the back of the occupied and injured monster.

Jareth managed to finish it off with a gravity hammer strike to the abdomen that pulverized the internal organs of the beast and brought it down with the additional cumulative strike from the other summons to ensure that it died without retaliation with its' last bit of energy before dying.

Moments after the monster was felled, the bell for the 3rd wave rang and we each recalled one of our summons to make room while retreating while remaining safe within the protection of our remaining summon. Older and stronger summoners moved past us as we retreated and what we heard behind us were deafening yells and seismic movements from monster rushing towards the newest group of summoners. There was no chance for us to take on all of those significantly stronger monsters and we hightailed it to the back of the line with the last remaining bits of energy.

Those two hours truly exhausted us and not only our bodies were sore, but our mind were fatigued from keeping control of more than one summon and directing them in battle. Once we made it and found an area to rest and recover, we looked over at each other, both of us covered in dirt and blood-stained, and began laughing at the ridiculousness and horror of what we just experienced. With the feeling of safety our current position presented, we collapsed near each other and just enjoyed the feeling of survival and the endorphins leaving our body, making us a noodly mess.

We were by no means done fighting, but we would rest while we could. Through an unstated agreement, we both stuck together as if we were actual partners despite having only met each other once before. We closed our eyes and did our best to relax while we still could, soon enough giant and dangerous monsters would be closing in soon enough and would require everyone to work together to bring them down before they made it to the gate. Musashi and Jareth remained out to protect us, but they too were resting on the ground, but ready to defend us at a moments notice.