In the middle of the bizarre labyrinth’s corridor, Ethan was shadowboxing next to Beet. The hall was about a hundred yards long, and both ends were being guarded by a pair of wendigo shades.
It had been more than two weeks since they entered this place, and if not for Ani’s confirmation, he’d never believed that less than a month had passed.
They devoted the first three days to getting new shades for Beet. After arduous fights with six wendigos, Beet got his four shades which he controlled with almost full efficiency. The actual powers of Beet’s new comrades were about early or mid tier-4, but these creatures were nothing like the rheas or the wolves. Their hefty paws with long claws, excellent body coordination, sharp teeth with strong jaws, and thick tails covered with resilient scales were making them all the more deadly.
Thankfully, they were lucky enough to find all of them alone. Ethan was getting convinced that the wendigos stayed separated like the wyverns he fought before, but on the fifth day, they noticed that wasn’t the case. Fighting four of them even with Beet’s new shades was a challenge in itself. They both got serious injuries and had to give a break for the rest of the day.
The intense battles for the following ten days made the duo much more cautious, but despite the close calls, they were both enjoying the improvements in their teamwork and the marvels of the [Mana Sense]’s absence.
Indeed, life wasn’t how it used to be without [Mana Sense]. Every skill Ethan used, felt lacking a substance, but also more natural. He noticed many things that he wasn’t aware of before. The most important one was, thanks to his new skills, he was ignoring his body too much. Since he wasn’t able to do his mana exercises lately, and trying to advance his skills without [Mana Sense] was way too complicated, he gave his full attention to his own body.
Inspired by the wendigos who had such precise control over their body, he started observing his newly enhanced body and found that in many areas he was wasting the efficiency of his new stats. His highest stat, agility, gave him the flexibility to do more complex moves, but that wasn’t all there was. He was also able to burden his body much more without crippling himself. Thanks to his refined body, the sudden increase or decrease in his momentum now had new limits, and this was opening new possibilities in his style.
As he dropped every training and focused on these aspects for the past weeks, he found many similarities with his skill [Long Jump]. This skill was also all about squeezing the potential of the body for a moment of boost, and analyzing the skill in the absence of [Mana Sense], turned out much more fruitful. He made more progress in this short time than ever since he got the skill.
Ethan continued his shadow box in a trance as the fights with the wendigos were playing in the corner of his mind. He kept pushing his body with sharp turns, switching to a different position abruptly, and using [Long Jump] to feel the changes on his body, until he realized a new prospect.
‘DING! You’ve advanced [Long Jump] to rank 2.’
He let out a hearty laugh, still breathing heavily. ‘’Finally! There is nothing like getting rewarded for hard work. Give me the updates on the skill, Ani.’’
‘[Long Jump]: Condense your stamina to gain a boost of strength and agility for an instant. You can now use it with any part of your body. The stamina consumption is still 50, but the efficiency has improved by 50%.’
Ethan first tried the same old way and jumped horizontally with the skill. The energy that gathered on his leg separated toward his back and spine to give more support. It was only for the moment of the jump and disappeared right after. Still, that push was more than enough to make him launch like a rocket.
As he landed rather unsteadily, he turned to look back excitedly. ‘’That should be around 15-20 yards. It’s good enough. Any more than this and I’d have trouble landing. Not to mention that’s just the start.’’ With a smile, he got into a stance and activated the skill just before his punch. His fist thrust forward like a bullet and even made a small whistling sound as it passed through the air. He made a few more punches until he got used to it and stopped himself with glee in his eyes. ‘’Now that’s what I’m talking about! That’s no longer a long jump, though. Change the name of the skill to [Overcharge], Ani.’’
‘Understood.’
Ethan turned to Beet and grinned. ‘’Call two of your shades, let me see what else I can do.’’ Looks like I finally have a use for those stamina potions.
Sadly, the skill only gave a boost for a moment and no more. This created many balancing issues after the boost was gone. Yet, after two days of constant spars with the shades, he was able to discern the best uses of the skill. Complicated moves just made it worse for him, but a simple slash or a straight stab with his daggers was perfect. Not to mention, when used with the right timing, his kicks became tools of destruction, making him consider if he should go for more Endurance stat.
Once he felt ready to try his new skill on real enemies, the duo resumed their way into the labyrinth while leaving marks on the walls. About 10 days ago, they started making signs on the walls in order to be aware if they passed the same place twice, and so far they didn’t see any of the marks they’ve left, making Ethan suspect that there were spatial enchantments around the place because the size of this trial was getting absurd.
As always, before taking a turn, Ethan extended his head out to see if the road was empty and quickly noticed the creatures not far away from them. Just about 50 yards away, four wendigos were pacing up and down along the corridor, and above them, there was another one, sleeping on top of a ledge that extended from the wall.
One of the beasts noticed him, but without giving it a chance to warn the others, he [Blink]ed next to the sleeping one. Grasping Devi with a reverse grip, he stabbed downward toward the back of the beast and activated [Overcharge] simultaneously. With the sudden acceleration, his dagger penetrated the heart of the creature from the back. The beast’s eyes opened wide, but it didn’t move at all.
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Ethan was thrilled to finally kill one in a single move. The ridiculously thick scales of the wendigos weren’t much of a problem anymore.
The one who noticed him first, let out a roar before jumping from the ground. He barely parried the claw and threw himself back to avoid its teeth. The other three were on him in no time. Another claw clashed with his dagger and just before his [Blink], the wendigo’s tail wrapped around his leg and tossed him to the wall. A second before the crash, he managed to use [Blink] and appeared next to Beet, dropping to the ground like a sack.
‘’Yeah, that happened,’’ he commented before jumping to his feet with an amused smile. ‘’It was a good start, though. Let’s go together. These bastards are not the types to fool around.’’
Four wendigos were already running at full speed toward them—two of them from the ground and the other two from the walls at the sides. Their claws were piercing the stones every time, and they were pushing themselves forward.
When they arrived, Beet’s shades picked one each and stopped their charge by jumping forward. Right after the collision, Ethan joined them with a [Blink] and slashed his dagger with another [Overcharge], cutting the head of the beast cleanly.
A lost head meant a berserk wendigo with blind rage.
Beet immediately pulled his shade back, and the headless wendigo started running everywhere and attacking anything it found. It was the second time they had done this. The first time, it was a single wendigo, and all it did was make it harder to kill the beast, but also gave them an idea to use it against groups.
All three of the shades arranged their position to stay away from the headless one while Ethan sent a [Shadow Spike] to lure the beast toward its companions.
When it started attacking a different wendigo, the duo gave their focus on the rest with a light heart. The shades were able to delay the real ones only for so long, but at least together with Beet’s [Blood Edge], the damage they caused was considerable. Adding Ethan’s unpredictable sneak attacks, they managed to kill two of them in under five minutes.
At the same time, the headless one also died under the claws of its old friend, but not before severing its leg.
Beet’s shades surrounded the cripple wendigo and started attacking from all sides. Both Ethan and Beet watched from the side. The moment the beast grabbed a shade with both hands, Ethan [Blink]ed behind it and pierced Devi into its heart. When it wasn’t enough to break the ice, the shade pushed the original back and helped him to penetrate the heart thoroughly.
He pulled his dagger back and turned toward Beet with a pleasing look. ‘’Good catch! You’re getting better with every fight.’’ Noticing Beet’s confusion, he raised an eyebrow. ‘’Didn’t you make your shade push the beast just now?’’
When Beet shook his head, they both turned to look at the Wendigo shade who just got rid of the original’s grab and stood still close to Ethan.
He took a step forward with a weird look and murmured. ‘’Maybe it was a coincidence?’’ Getting close to the shade, he waved his hand before its face, but there was no response. ‘’That it just tried to release itself from the grip?’’
Since there was not a single reaction from the shade, they dropped the subject and started looting the wendigo corpses before continuing on their way.
Another two weeks passed in the seemingly endless labyrinth. The sense of time was completely messed up for Ethan. He didn’t dislike fighting strong enemies in this strange environment, though. There was clear progress in their battles, and Beet was getting quite a bit of essence from the tier-5 beasts.
He himself gained a single level and was closing halfway toward level 42. The stats he gained naturally went directly into Endurance. Although he wasn’t planning to change his build too much, he still wanted to give a few levels worth of stats to increase his stamina.
The [Overcharge] was a good skill for ignoring the thick scales or fighting against the high-tier enemies, but it wasn’t something he was sorely lacking. Thanks to Aether Bloom and the returns from Devi, he rarely found his mana low lately, but he was planning to buy more skills from Mirasatra that might require more mana. So, wasting his precious stats for his stamina while appealing, was probably a stupid move.
Just after their first month in this place, Ethan finally saw the door, along with the 20 wendigos in front of it. They were more than a hundred yards away, and he was hiding behind a big rock along with Beet. He considered the possibilities, and knowing these beast's behavior, decided to go all out.
‘’Can you control your shades from here?’’
Beet shook his head.
‘’How about you only give them the order to protect me from the other wendigos?’’ he asked with a frown and felt relieved when he saw Beet’s nod. ‘’Alright. I’ll go first with your shades and you’ll join us when there are five or so left.’’
As Ethan stepped out from the rock, four wendigo shades moved along with him, getting the attention of the real ones. He called his daggers and picked a victim for himself before using [Blink] twice and appearing in front of it. Crossing his daggers like scissors, he activated [Overcharge] and slashed them at the same time, cutting its head off.
Before even the head dropped to the ground, he [Blink]ed at the back of the horde and unleashed his [Mana Aura]. This time, he swung his dagger diagonally and removed another beast’s head with [Overcharge].
All of this happened in three seconds, and the chaos started among the wendigos.
Ethan appeared away from the headless ones and started fighting the others while waiting for the shades to arrive. He was frequently using [Blink]s because if these creatures managed to pin him down, he was good as gone. After fighting with them for a month, he learned to not underestimate them. The armor he wore was already his spare one, and even that was barely holding itself together with claw and teeth marks all over it.
The headless ones managed to stir trouble at the back, but he still found himself fighting against a dozen. Wherever he [Blink], the wendigos were following with astounding speeds. Only after the help of the shades, he was able to fight back instead of retreating.
The shades were commanded to protect him, and Ethan was using this as best as he could. He tried to keep the battle in a small area and gave lethal injuries to the wendigos swiftly. Because it wasn’t possible to attack the same beast twice when there were more coming in a frenzy.
He abused his skills and depleted his mana in just an hour, but it was worth it. Only six remained and all of them had their heads on their shoulders.
Ethan [Blink]ed next to Beet and drank a mana potion. ‘’Care to join?’’
Beet also chugged a mana potion, showing that the damage his shades took was nothing to scoff at, and charged toward the wendigos impatiently.
Ethan chuckled behind his back and joined him. The duo fought their last battle zealously in front of the giant door and butchered their targets brutally. When the last of them died, the door didn’t even give them any time to rejoice, and took a small part of Beet’s mana immediately before opening slowly.
Ethan placed his foot on the corpse's shoulder and pulled his dagger back before looking at the door with his lips pressed together. ‘’Shit. I forgot about that. I hope we can find a place to rest there.’’