Kind Demon King

With eyes filled with hatred, Lupus drew an arc in the air with his sword. Around 10 spears made out of the same red mana that blasted us appeared where his sword went.

“Roar!”

They flew towards me. Fast! My first reaction was to raise my shield to block it but I quickly changed my approach and rolled on the ground. I managed to dodge all of them though I was thrown away due to impact and rock shards and dust rained on me. I looked where I stood just a second ago. The ground was carved with Lupus’s magic and 4 to 5 small craters were formed.

Blocking attacks was often the easiest and safer option. Yeah, dodging and parrying were better but most people didn’t have the reflexes and combat experience required for it. Even I, a veteran had to block from time to time. But here is the problem: When your enemy is from another species that’s at least 150 kilos heavier than you or has magical abilities blocking will have your arms getting ripped off.

Seeing me struggle to get up, Lupus opened his arms.

“Wait, no.”

With one agile and elegant swipe of his sword, he closed the distance between us.

“You are not a Japanese samurai, you weeb!”

I am sure I have seen that movement in video games before! But I didn’t have the time to think about it. I let my sword go, two handing my shield. I tilted my shield, his sword scraping it and causing a lot of noise. I pushed it off me. But before I could celebrate dodging a fatal attack his knee was slammed into my chest.

(Stone Skin is activated. Your defense increases by 10 for 10 minutes. Your agility decreases by 5 during skill duration.)

Read it like an open book!

I felt my entire rib cage shake with the impact. I was thankful his knee was this big. If he was smaller and managed to hit my liver accurately, even Stone Skin wouldn’t be able to save me. He wanted to pull his knee back but I hugged it. He wanted to slash me with his sword but I raised my shield, blocking it.

Normally blocking this kind of attack directly would cause my arms to go numb. But I had two things working for me:

I was close enough to smell his breath. He was tall. His arms were long. His sword was long. Even if he was the best swordsman this world had ever seen, with these conditions he wouldn’t be able to swing his sword fully.

The second thing was the tip of my shield was pushed into his body. Without him realizing it, I was using his body as support.

He also must understand he can’t slash me with his sword so he raised his free claw.

“Have you ever heard of oil wrestling?”

While I didn’t have the chance to ever participate in one of the tournaments, me not knowing wrestling was impossible. It was in my blood after all.

I also was trained in several schools of grappling during the super soldier program but let me have this.

“Wha-“

“Aghhhhh!”

I roared as I lifted his leg up.

Do you remember when I said he was at least 150 kilos heavier than me?

Yeah, that was an underestimation. This motherfucker was at least 250 kilos heavier than me. My muscles, which already felt like they were going to burst out of my skin due to the effect of Monstrous Strength swelled even more. My joints made creaking voices as I lifted him up.

“What? How!”

I slammed him to the ground. He must be heavier than even what I thought since the noise of him hitting the ground was loud enough to vibrate my entire skeleton. I got up and noticed my nose bleeding. I felt dizzy probably due to the pressure change or all of my blood rushing to my muscles. This wasn’t the first time I felt like this after lifting something heavy but I haven’t felt this bad- at least from lifting heavy- since I stopped myself from getting crushed by a Behemoth class when my armor malfunctioned.

I picked my sword up.

“Bastard.”

I threw myself to the ground as soon as I heard that. A wave of red energy passed just above my head. Dumb bitch, shouting before attackin-

“Motherfuck-“

Gods punished me for my hubris when another wave hit me. I rolled on the ground several times before stopping.

“Why this keeps happening?”

Blood dripped down on the ground from my forehead. I saw several pieces of my armor on the ground. I could have seen more if my blood didn’t obscure my vision. I didn’t even have the time to wipe it off since Lupus was in front of me. I barely blocked his horizontal slash which caused me to scream with pain like a bitch because my elbow twisted further than its natural range. I couldn’t even wonder if it was broken since I had to step back to dodge a vertical slash, which cut my shoulder.

Pathetic. I couldn’t even strike back.

“What happened to killing me last?”

Rather than answering me, he kicked me. My innards which were still affected by his knee strike before were thrown into chaos. I doubled over and threw up. I felt his hand at the back of my head and I realized it was massive, even more than I thought. He pushed my head down. I couldn’t even resist.

The smell overwhelmed me. I wanted to throw up once more. That coupled with the fact I couldn’t breathe caused primal panic to overcome my body and soul. I shook my arms uncontrollably which did nothing.

“NO. NO. NO! I CAN’T DIE LIKE THIS.”

I tried to come up with something. However, pain and lack of air clouded my mind. I could only claw the ground as the darkness of unconsciousness started to overtake me.

“Sorry. Looks like chose the wrong person, Star.”

“Poyraz!”

Pressure in my head was lifted as I felt the wind. Did someone call for me?

“Heal Minor Wounds.”

My body felt hot as someone wiped my face.

“Poyraz! Wake up! Stay with me!”

I coughed.

“Blanche?”

I realized I was in her arms. She was looking at me, her blue eyes opened wide with worry. I coughed some more and forced myself to smile.

“You look better.”

I wanted to shoot my seductive smile but I soon realized that my face was still covered with vomit.

“Human!!!”

“Ice Wall.”

Lupus tried to slash us. But before that countless thick ice walls appeared, blocking him from reaching us.

“Cure our wounds and soothe our pain, Anshar.”

“Poyraz! You are okay!”

A golden light covered me as my pain subsided. I lifted my head and saw Agatha and Percavel. Their clothes were ripped, bloodied, and covered with dust but they looked fine.

“Where is Dun-“

I heard heavy footsteps beside me.

“Do you have a plan?”

He asked me that? I must hit my head hard.

“I have a theory.”

Regardless of my surprise, I answered him.

“Push him back. Damaging him isn’t our main goal. Just draw him back to the direction we came from.”

He looked at me with suspicious eyes before nodding slightly.

“Buff me.”

Agatha buffed him and Blanche.

“Blanche. Don’t use that mode until I gave you the signal.”

I stood up. Bleeding was stopped thanks to Blanche and Agatha. While I still had open wounds causing a lot of pain, I was good to go.

“Per, you can’t block more than 2 consecutive hits. Agatha, if needed create that shield you used before.”

With Percavel in middle leading the charge, we faced Lupus once again.

“Don’t overreach, don’t overexert until my signal!”

My theory was based on 3 facts.

According to what I learned about dungeons, bosses were usually located at the place where mana was most concentrated.

According to Wolf King, his kin fell after he died. This lead me to believe his existence or in this case, mana is related to his kin’s capabilities.

Lastly and most importantly, Lupus admitted to building this road. But the road’s quality deteriorated as he went further from the place he stayed.

Maybe I was wrong. Maybe all of my speculations were flawed from the beginning.

Eh, fuck it. This motherfucker was too strong for us to defeat anyways. A little bit of gamble isn’t going to hurt.

Just as I thought of this, a claw strike caused Percavel’s head to snap back and splattered blood everywhere. Okay, maybe it will hurt a little. Duncan was stabbed by Lupus’s claw. Okay, maybe it will hurt a lot. I pulled my bowstring back, shooting two arrows at the same time. One was blocked while the other one split into two thanks to my bow’s option and pierced his stomach and left thigh. It wasn’t deep but hearing its roar was satisfying.

“Lightning Orb!”

“Mountain Smash!”

“Roar of Wind!”

“Blinding Light!”

“He is regenerating.”

I whispered to myself as I saw wounds we painfully caused in his body close in mere seconds.