Level 1 Fallen

After savoring the feeling of my arm still being fully attached to the rest of my body, I led Diane back towards the chaotic fight on the first platform. Another ten wyverns had died since we left, but a few wounds had similarly opened up on the dragon's body. "So, what type of enchantment did you make?" Diane asked hesitantly as she followed behind, as I hadn't told her exactly what skills I had used. All she had to go off of for it was the list of runes that I needed.

"If I'm right, it should be the equivalent of a grandmaster-level skill." I answered, though that was only a rough assumption. I was combining two master skills and three intermediate skills, so I hoped the final result of that fusion would reach that threshold.

Once we got back to the platform, I took a deep breath, extending my hand towards the mass of winged creatures flying through the air. "Now, let's just hope this works as well as I expected."

With that, I activate the enchantment that had been given the name Assassin's Storm, combining Martial Intent-X, Shadow Arsenal-X, Assassinate, Greater Detect Weakness, and Empty Bow Expertise. In my vision, I identified all of the wyverns as targets, together with the dragon. I could see red circles appearing on all of their bodies. For each red circle, a black or gold spear appeared in the air above me.

More and more weapons began to manifest, until hundreds of spears filled the space above my body. "Now… that's just cheating." Diane muttered under her breath, before the spears all launched forward at once. I could hear the thick, wet sounds as the spears pierced into the organs of dozens of wyverns.

Every time a wyvern died, the spears that pierced it disappeared, reforming above me and firing at any surviving targets in a constant rain. This could lead to only one ultimate conclusion, that being the dragon alone pierced with all spears after the rest of the monsters died. Furthermore, these spears were under the same stealth effect that I was, so the monsters couldn't determine where the attacks were coming from.

There were sharp cries from the wyverns, and even the dragon let out pained roars as more and more spears began to pierce through its body. With such an overwhelming number of weapons, the dragon's body soon collapsed, causing the platform to shake. "Quickly loot as many of the bodies as you can." I said, running forward.

"Huh? Aren't you stuffing them into your inventory?" She asked, though I only put one each of the Wyverns, Flame Wyverns, and Elder Wyverns into my inventory.

"I don't have the inventory space to waste on so many wyverns." I said with a shake of my head. "We don't have the time tonight to dismantle everything in the dungeon, so I'm going to be putting the dragon corpses in my inventory, and take care of them later. For the wyverns, just take their basic loot, and let's move on."

"Won't we breeze through the rest of the dungeon easily with that new move of yours?" Diane asked, tilting her head as she joined me in collecting the loot from the various bodies. However, I simply shook my head again.

"That technique won't work very well in the fifth region. I might be able to get away with it in the fourth, but that's as far as it will go. The core of the technique is to recycle any attacks that kill their targets, so it is best useful when dealing with a lot of easier to kill targets, and only a smaller number of those with high power. Against a group of lesser dragons, I would need to spam it fifty times to show an effect like that, and that would give them plenty of time to lock onto my position."

Diane widened her eyes slightly, but nodded her head as I continued. "Even with the first three regions cleared out this fast, we'll be pushing it if we want to get a full clear of the dungeon in two hours. For now, let's speed through to get the chests, and then we'll look at what we can grab."

Diane's eyes narrowed decisively, and we quickly collected the rest of the bodies. After that, we jumped on the bike, and began to drive around to collect the chests from the first three regions. The first region was very disappointing, only giving Diane and I a scale each. On the second floor, Diane acquired our first Mana Breathing skill book.

I called it the first, because we both managed to acquire one from the boss chest on the third floor. I gave all three to Diane, giving her permission to sell the spare two later. Since they were such high-value skills, players might be willing to pay a premium price for them.

At this point, it had been nearly twenty minutes since we entered the dungeon, so we were pressed for time. "From here on out, I'm going to be driving fast. It might be better for you to stay on the third platform and wait for me to come back." I suggested, but Diane shook her head, grabbing onto my waist.

"I can take it. Don't worry about me." She said, and so I nodded my head, driving across the gap to the next platform. Before we even arrived, I could see dozens of glowing, red crystals hovering in the air, each with a ring of fire around them.

Immediately, these crystals turned towards us, drawn by some form of dungeon rule. Yet, they were unable to detect our presence under the effects of Ghost-X, so they could only look in our direction.

Without hesitation, I cast the same enchantment as I used before. This time, I targeted all of the spirit crystals that I could see, along with the Elder Wyverns resting on the large platforms below.

As soon as the first spears flew out to strike at the spirit crystals, a torrent of flame shot towards me. The collection of spirit crystals had all fired in the same direction, causing me to abruptly drive along the perimeter of the platform while repeating the enchantment again. More and more spears began to pour in from all directions, making the end result clear.

Once again, Diane and I hurried to collect the scarce loot, before making our way to the real challenge of this dungeon, the fifth and final region. Here, my new enchantment was not going to help much.

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I could see dragons freely flying through white clouds, my grip tightening on the handlebars. The only way to fight here was to try to pick them off one by one. With that in mind, my eyes scanned the dragons, ultimately locking onto one near the edge of the region.

Taking a deep breath, I flew towards that dragon, activating my Ghost Zone to wrap around it. Like this, there should be less chance that other dragons are drawn by our fight. At the same time, I fired Martial Intent-X through the front barrels of the bike, striking against the dragon. It let out a pained roar, its scales dented in at the position of impact, but showed no real damage otherwise.

Thoroughly aggravated, the dragon turned in the direction it felt the attack, firing off a deadly breath in my direction. Having expected something like this, I twisted the path beneath the bike, sending us off to the side. Though, doing so caused Diane to cry out in astonishment, her raised voice attracting the attention of the dragon.

Its eyes followed us as we drove through the air around it, and I fired a blade made of projected energy towards the base of its neck, where my Greater Detect Weakness showed the weakest part of its scales. Even still, the cut seemed far too shallow. At the very least, though, it had cut through the scales.

I was reminded of my fight against my former player, mentally comparing him to this dragon. Despite my skills having not evolved to the master rank in that fight, he was far easier to kill. Even though he should have been a higher species of dragon, his sheer level had weakened him.

Now, this was a real dragon fight. "Diane, take over the bike!" I shouted, startling Diane as I jumped from the bike, making her scramble to grab the handlebars.

"What?! But I can't make platforms!" She shouted indignantly, but I had already jumped onto the dragon's neck, piercing into the open wound with a projected spear.

I looked back, noticing the bike starting to fall as Diane struggled to regain some form of control. "Put it in your inventory, then!" I called back, the dragon's scales starting to glow. "I'll make platforms for you!"

Diane gave an exasperated sigh, sticking the bike in her own inventory as a projected platform appeared beneath her feet. She briefly vanished, soon appearing on the back of the dragon's head. "Why'd you even bring the bike here, then!?" She retorted, driving her daggers into the dragon's eyes.

"Because I was hoping it would help. Right now, it's just getting in the way." I grunted, focusing on extending the spear. Diane's attack had cancelled whatever type of draconic magic it wanted to activate, so I just needed to extend my spear into its heart. "These things are too strong to take out in a single hit, so the bike is making it harder for me to fight."

A moment later, the dragon's body went slack, its wings falling to its side. Without waiting, I put the dragon into my inventory and grabbed Diane before she could fall. "We're running from here on. Let me know if you start to fall!"

"I should have stayed back on the last platform!" She called out reluctantly as we began to run towards the next dragon. I still had Ghost Zone deployed around us, and brought the next dragon into it as I created a sharp spear, throwing it into the dragon's mouth. This stopped it from being able to use its breath weapon, even if it wasn't enough to greatly debilitate it. From there, Diane and I ducked past its claws, latching onto its body to inflict wounds to both its neck and head.

Each dragon took us nearly two minutes to kill in this manner, and there were a total of forty dragons flying through the fifth region. However, there was only one true Red Dragon, positioned near the lone platform with the boss chest.

As more and more of the lesser dragons began to disappear, it seemed to catch on. After more than half of them were gone, it watched closely. Then, when it noticed that it had lost sight of another dragon, it immediately fired a thick pillar of flame towards the last position where it noticed the dragon's presence. Meaning, Diane and I had to contend with a pillar of flame barreling straight towards us.

Without a moment to consider any alternatives, we both sought shelter behind the body of the dragon we were fighting, letting the powerful breath impact it squarely. Although the Red Dragon's breath was strong enough to kill its lesser kin, it was not strong enough to pierce directly through it and hit us. I just had to wait until the breath had ended before storing the dragon in my inventory.

However, the sudden breath of the boss had alerted the remaining dragons. They began to cluster together around the boss, looking in the direction that the boss had attacked. "So, Drake… what's the plan now?" Diane asked nervously.

"The smart thing to do would be to turn around and leave the dungeon." I pointed out, standing on a projected platform with her.

"Okay, but what's the thing we're actually going to do?" She countered, and I chuckled slightly.

I looked at the group, taking a deep breath. "We're going to fight." I said, aiming my hand forward. "I just really hope that this works."

After I said that, I began to repeatedly cast the Assassin's Storm enchantment. The first volley of attacks rained out, striking the group of dragons in a dense cluster of spears. However, none of the spears dealt fatal damage, even with me managing to send ten shots in the time it took them to respond. At most, the spears stuck into their bodies like needles.

Although more spears were still flying forward, the boss created a red barrier around the group. This barrier was strong enough that the spears crashed against it, unable to penetrate through. Meanwhile, the rest of the dragons let out furious roars, spewing flaming breaths in our direction.

I grabbed Diane, picking her up and using Glancing Steps-X to move to the platform behind the boss, evading the wave of fire surging at our previous location. There, I released Diane, who lunged for the undefended boss's back, activating her own Ghost-X skill. The greatest benefit of this skill was that it allowed one to remain unhidden even when performing violent actions.

With that in mind, I ran to the side, creating a giant hammer to smash the spears into one of the various dragons. It roared in pain, its heart pierced through. The various spears in its body disappeared, appearing above my head and flying towards other dragons. However, this also revealed my position, earning another round of fire that I had to abruptly run away from.

At this point, I was nothing but a distraction, moving around beneath the giant monsters and getting their attention. Meanwhile, Diane was moving into position to deliver a fatal blow to the unaware boss.

Thankfully, she didn't keep me waiting for long, and I soon heard a cry of pain from the giant dragon. I immediately broke away from the dragon I had been about to strike, appearing on the shoulder of the dragon where a fresh wound had appeared. Like before, I slammed a spear straight into the wound, hammering it in as deeply as I could to drive it down into the dragon's heart.