The Forgotten Legacy

Fighting the sparrows had gone from incredibly frustrating and time consuming to being almost too easy. A few times he had to change tactics as a few of the sparrow had tried to attack the others but he caught this in time and was able to kill them before they had a chance to let their spear attacks go at them. After the third wave of sparrows though it had become too dangerous for the others to not be paying attention and instead had to focus on making sure they wouldn’t be attacked, they had also started letting off their own attacks at any monster that got close, mostly Viv and Gabe, as they had ranged attacks.

During the battles Shaun had figured out a few things, using lightning used a bit more mana than the other elements but in comparative power per mana used it was just so much stronger, the power behind each attack easily three times as strong if not more than the fire element. What he also found was that when he tried to use lightning through the gauntlet it was a complete and utter failure, he had got hit with backlash from trying to use the gauntlet, the lightning instead going completely haywire and causing some back lash. If he was to guess this was because the gauntlet had no corresponding lightning runes, as well as no direct lightning element in it, only the separate fire and air, something he would look to see if he could fix.

When he was nearly done with the 9th wave, only leaving one of the sparrow alive, he went back to the group to talk about what they were going to do for the next wave, the starling was powerful, and its attack, if it had a chance to let it off, would be too much for them to avoid, let alone defend against. “Hey guys, the boss will be coming up in the next wave and to be honest I don’t think I will be able to protect you against its attack and fight at the same time.” At that moment the last sparrow decided to send a spear at them, he simply created a barrier, already prepared for the attack to block it. “Its probably best if you all leave now.”

“Can’t we stay? Fighting these higher levelled monsters has already gotten me a level!” Gabe protested, and he got that, they had had to fight off a few of the sparrow over the last few waves, even with the experience split between them it was a lot of experience when they were over 5 levels under the sparrow.

“Shaun’s right, my entire team fought the starling and we barely all made it out alive. If we stay we are all going to be at risk.” Viv directed at Gabe. “But…..” She then looked back at him, “If you focus on the starling we can fight against the other sparrows. If we need to, we can evacuate from the dungeon, but only if you can take the starling out in time. We will be careful, but we can do this.”

Shaun looked at all of them, they all had the same look on their face, they were determined to stay, even if it meant putting themselves in more danger than it was probably worth. He was confident in being able to attack the starling before it got its star attack off, but there was a chance that he couldn’t. He couldn’t force them to leave though so he would just need to go all out on his attack. He still had about half of his mana left, he hadn’t had to waste anywhere near as much as he had during his first run through the dungeon, that and the fact that he had just under twice as much as he did before from gaining the lightning affinity, meant he had a lot to spare.

“Fine, but at the first sign of trouble you get out. I will do what I can to kill as many of them as I can straight up, but I can’t guarantee your safety. You will retreat out of the dungeon if you have to.”

They all agreed without argument, that was all he could hope for really. He told them that when he killed the last sparrow that they should run and loot all of the bodies and then retreat back as fast as they can. Turning away from them he decided he would throw as much power as he could at the birds as soon as they appeared, using as much mana as necessary to cause as much damage as he could. He would use the 1 minute between waves to power up his attack, not having to worry about looting the birds during this time.

It didn’t take long to kill the last sparrow and when he got the notification that the wave ended he moved up into he air and started channelling as much lightning as he could, when he hit the point where he was at the same amount of mana that he had used during the arena fight with Trevor he didn’t stop, only 30 seconds had passed and he still had more mana he could use. He raised his hands into the air and called down lightning from above, striking into him, instantly raising the amount of power he was holding onto by threefold. He didn’t stop though, he kept calling down the lightning from the sky, getting used to the feeling of what it took to call forth the element externally to the channel it into himself. After the 3rd blast of lightning was called into him he felt that he had reached the limit of what his body could handle. At this point he was barely able to keep control of the power inside of him. Seconds passed until, until the notification appeared that the 10th wave had started.

As soon as he saw the birds appear including the starling, he moved himself closer to them in the air. It seemed that the starling wasn’t going to wait this time to start its attack, as soon as it felt his presence the world dungeon started to darken, the starling channelling its own power. He wasn’t going to let it though.

He released all the power inside of him, aiming directly at the starling, but there was too much power to control easily. Instead of the lightning going only at the starling strike after strike of power was released from him, draining everything that he had been holding inside. It was as if it had a mind of its own, each tendril of lightning that was released quickly found a monster to hit, but even then it didn’t stop. It powered through the first sparrow it found and like a chain reaction found the next, and the next, until all around him every single sparrow that was in striking distance was connected by a chain of power, including the starling. The monster was still powering up its attack, but he would be having none or that. With a final push he went every bit of power he had left into he attack, cause a bright flash to light up the now dark dungeon. It ripped through him, causing some internal damage to his mana channels, but nowhere near as much as when he had first bonded the element.

When he had no more power to give he cut of the lightning and watched to see what the result of his attack was. Every single bird that had been caught in his web dropped from the sky, completed toasted and streaming from his attack, they weren’t moving, simply dropping form where they had been held in the sky with his power. Checking the starling, it too had not been able to survive the attack. In all it looked like he had successfully killed 10 of the monsters, leaving only 5 remaining.

He had used most of his mana in the attack, leaving only 1000 remaining of his over 7000 total, it was a lot of mana to use in one attack but it had done exactly what he had needed it to. Lowering himself back to the ground, he saw that the others were currently fighting off 3 of the sparrow, Viv and Gabe using their arrow, which seemed to be powered by some mana infusion skills, while Eric was protecting them from the spears that would occasionally be sent their way. Deciding not to interfere, not wanting to take away the experience they would get, he just watched, only interfering if they needed him too.

It took them much longer to kill the sparrow than it would have taken him to finish off but he didn’t mind, instead he focused on regaining his mana, and thinking about how he was going to approach the wolves in the next wave, or if he even should. When they had taken out the last of the birds he quickly ran to loot the starling first and then the others he had killed, the others doing the same. He got all the notifications for the kills, happy to see that he had gained a level in the fight.

*Class: Elemental Blade Slinger has levelled up by +1 levels. [Advanced] Elemental Blade Slinger has reached Level 38. +3 Str, +2 Dex, +3 End, +3 Vit, +4 Soul gained*

*Race: Human has levelled up by +1 levels. Human (E) has reached Level 34. +16 Ap gained*

By the time they reconvened they had only seconds to figure out their approach. “You guys going to retreat or stay? I haven’t fought the wolves yet so don’t know what to expect.” He asked them.

“I have, they are quick, strong and fight as a pack. We barely managed to complete the first wave of them when I did it last. They are also more durable than you expect. Between Gabe, Eric and I we can probably handle one maybe two in a fight. You though….with that lightning? I have no idea.”

What Viv said made him consider how they should approach it, none of them had shown an inclination to leave, which left him as the one to decide if they should continue and if so how he would do it.

“Okay here is what we are going to do. You are all staying behind me until we find out how much damage I can do to these monsters, if I can deal with them effectively I will try and let some past one at a time, if I cant you run. If you get overwhelmed, you run. If I give the call to retreat, you run. Deal?”

They all agreed, and just in time too, as they all got the message that the 11th wave was to begin. He didn’t know when he had become de facto leader of the group, but he didn’t really like it. This was the reason why he liked fighting alone, he didn’t have to consider others in a fight, he just had to focus on himself and the monsters. He had put himself into this situation though, he brought them into this dungeon, so they were his responsibility. The monsters appeared, thankfully the others were already behind him and them.

*Dire Wolf – Level 35*

The wolves were just as expected, 15 level 35 Dire Wolf. He had barely got a chance to more than identify them last time he got to this wave, they were bigger than the average wolf, all of them easily standing as tall as his chest, they had grey fur and their teeth and claws were sharp. As one they all lifted their head into the sky and howled, the result was intimidating, even for him. Rather than wait for them to attack first, Shaun did something he had yet to try, he powered up his sword with an elemental strike, this time using lightning.

He didn’t use a lot of mana in the strike, only 100. It wasn’t about killing them but seeing what the impact would be. He had sent it at the closest group of wolves, and when it hit there was less of an explosion and more of a static blast that hit out at the surrounding wolves. The attack did some damage to the wolf he hit, sending it into a convulsing heap on the ground, the ones hit by the blast seemed to lock up and twitch, he didn’t know how long that would last though.

The wolves that his attack hadn’t reached immediately started running directly towards him, overtaking the ones still unmoving from his attack. He ran at them head on, powering up another strike and just as he had reached them let it loose, hitting more of the wolves. He immediately followed up with his sword, attacking the wolf he had just shot with the strike, who was now convulsing on the ground. He drove his sword straight into its head, quickly removing it again and turning to the other wolves who had now circled around him. Sending out a pulse of his echo skill he found that the wolves he had initially hit were back on the move, all outside of the wolf he had directly hit. The others had three of the wolves focused on them, one more than they said they could handle, and the rest were now all focused on him.

He wasn’t stressed about the others, not too much at least, they had said they would retreat if they needed to. He was in a much more precarious situation, there was 10 wolves surrounding him now, including the ones that were recovering from his latest attack. They circled him as a group, not yet attacking, but they knew they had cornered their prey. Or so they thought anyway.

Concentrating air beneath him he launched himself into the air, it was not graceful in any way, but it got him above the circle of wolves, he sent down the quick lightning blasts with his sword, having no other choice as he didn’t have a hand free to actually cast a bolt of lightning, unable to use the hand with his gauntlet until he changed the runes around. His first two strikes managed to hit two of the wolves directly, while the third wolf managed to get out of the way, out of the 10 beasts though he had managed to get 8 of them in the radius of the static shock.

As he started falling back to the ground he aimed for a group of the wolves who had been effected by the shock, and when he landed quickly dispatched two of them before they managed to recover. They left him with 6 wolves to deal with, considering the two who were hit directly were still a convulsing mess on the ground. With this the wolves changed tactics and all came at him as a pack. He sent a fire strike through the gauntlet at the same time he entered into a fight with another of the wolves, using just his sword. Viv had been right though, they were quick, focusing on speed and strength over any other of their attributes, and he was unable to do any meaningful damage to the wolf with his sword.

I really need a better weapon for physical attacks, something with reach maybe, or even just an upgrade on the sword. Shaun now felt like he was dancing around with the wolves, every time one would come into attack he would dodge out of the way, sometimes straight towards another of the wolves who he would then attack with his sword, usually with a lightning strike channelled through his blade. One had managed to get a swipe in with their paw but he was able to turn it into more of a glancing swipe rather than a full blown mauling.

He slowly whittled down their numbers, with each strike of his sword or fireball from his gauntlet he was doing damage. He was able to redirect his position a few times to kill the wolves that were seriously effected by the lightning, and as their numbers continued to drop he was able to make more direct attacks on them. He didn’t know how long it had taken but eventually there were 11 dead wolves around him. Checking with his echo he found that the wolf he had hit right at the beginning of the wave had also died, not being able to recover from the strike that hit it.

Checking in on the others, they had managed to kill two of their wolves, although not easily by the looks of it. Eric was bleeding from many wounds on his body, mostly from getting clawed by the wolves, Gabe and Viv also looked like they had taken a few hits, but none of them looked like they were in serious danger in that moment. He again watched them, ready to interfere if needed, and while he waited he healed up all of his own wounds. While they fought he watched how well they moved together, it was clear that over the course of their battle they had found a decent rhythm. Eventually they killed the wolf and with it the last of the monsters of the wave.

*Wave 11 Completed – Wave 12 starting in 1 minute*

*You have defeated a (Dire Wolf – Lvl 35). Bonus experience for killing an opponent above your level gained. 3000 TE awarded*

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*You have defeated a (Dire Wolf – Lvl 35). Bonus experience for killing an opponent above your level gained. 3000 TE awarded*

Shaun got 12 notifications for his kills, not enough to get another level though, he wasn’t surprised as he had already gotten one in the last wave, he then quickly looted all of the wolves he had killed, getting pelts out of it, which didn’t really hold much value to him but could be sold for coin. When he was back with the others he didn’t delay in healing each of them with his gauntlet, just enough to take the edge off of their wounds, not having time to bring them back to 100%.

“Are you guys staying or going?” They all shared a look, clearly considering whether they should back out now or keep going.

“We stay, whether we can make it through the next wave though? I don’t know, we took down three of the wolves and after you healed us we are not in too bad of a shape to fight. So we will see.” Eric said for all of them.

“Same rules as last time. Get ready they are coming.” And with that he got ready for the 12th wave.