Chapter Five: Trial And Error

West looked at the towering beasts that were marching ever so close to him. The earth shook tirelessly with every step they took. If he ever wished to get out of this hellhole, then he should get rid of these abominations first, or at least get away from them. But he already knew that such methods were futile against the minotaurs. He needed a strategy, a sound one, to deal with these beasts. But first, he must gather all the information he could learn from their AI's behavior to formulate a pla-

A large mace suddenly swung itself towards West's face. He was so deep in thought that he did not notice the enormous weapon swinging in his direction until it was too late. The blow to his head was so strong that it sent him flying. He would have flown forever from the force of the swing if it wasn't for the cliff wall putting it to a stop. When his swiftly flying head made contact with the rocks, it easily broke his neck and killed him instantly.

West immediately gasped for air as soon as he revived. He was not expecting that! He cast a cautious look at the minotaurs that were once more slowly approaching him. He aimed his pistol at the closest one and fired at random locations on its body. All rounds bounced off its skin like they were nothing. His level was too low to lay a dent on them damage-wise.

"Damn it!" West cursed to himself as he quickly reloaded his weapon. "They don't have any weak spots at all!"

Once his gun's cartridge was filled, he aimed his gun at the closest minotaur again. But as he pointed his weapon at the giant beast, it was already swinging its axe at him. Fortunately for him, West was able to notice the attack way ahead of time and responded accordingly. With all his might, he leaped away from the axe swing, successfully dodging the lethal blow. West's body flopped hard upon landing. And as he slowly got up, he saw a minotaur in front of him that had its mace already swinging downwards. West was unable to avoid this one so all he did was look down at the ground and had his hands cover the back of his head, as if that would do anything. And not a second later, West heard the chilling sound of metal hitting flesh.

West winced, expecting the pain to follow up. But there was none. That's strange, West thought. He was supposed to be dead by now. But for some strange reason, he was still alive. A loud pained roar cut off his train of thought. He raised his head to look for the source of the sound. West's eyes went wide at what he saw. The minotaur who wielded the mace accidentally struck his fellow kin in the head! The blow was so strong that it shaved off a fourth of its health.

"Did that minotaur just commit friendly fire?" West thought out loud. He then saw another minotaur raise its axe upwards while glaring at him. But instead of dodging the attack, West hid behind another minotaur this time. And when the other minotaur brought its axe down, it struck the minotaur that West was hiding behind at, just as he had hoped.

"These damn muscle brains have a long reach, but that meant crap when it comes to close range and ended up hitting themselves. I can make something out of this." West rushed off from his hiding spot to lure another minotaur into hitting another one of its kind.

"Hey longface!" West shouted at the minotaurs as he waved his hands around. "Come get me!"

Enraged, all the minotaurs surrounded West while they raised their weapons high. West grinned darkly as he watched what happened next. When the minotaurs brought their weapons down, they ended up hitting each other. A large cloud of glowing cubes flew above their heads after the damage was inflicted. Not being aware of what was happening, the beasts attempted to swing their weapons one more time, only to hit each other again, and again, and again, and again. This minotaur on minotaur rumble went on until one of the giant beasts came down, its health finally depleted. The longer the fight went on, the larger the number of minotaurs dying. And with each kill, West received a tremendous amount of exp. The flow of exp that came in was so high that it raised West's level from one to five in mere minutes. West opened his skill slot and discovered that his second skill was back. A small feeling of happiness blossomed inside him upon seeing such sight. Although this moment of happiness was short-lived when a minotaur managed to get a hit on West. West's face was sliced off diagonally with a giant sword. It killed him instantly.

"Goddamnit." West cursed loudly as he came back to life again. He immediately opened his UI and checked his level. It was back to one. "I hate myself." He whispered, but the sound of contempt was still there. As he continued to sit still on the ground, he felt it tremble again. He raised his head and saw that the minotaurs have also respawned, and were now marching towards him. West let out a deep, frustrated sigh.

"Looks like we're doing this dance again."

After hours of dodging and parrying the minotaurs' attacks, West finally managed to get himself out of that cursed respawn area. With his mini-map left open at the side of his vision screen to guide him, West limped his way towards the zone's exit. The fight with the minotaurs took a toll on him. But at least he reached a decent level of six once it was over. Due to all of his loot dropping after his untimely death from earlier, West was unable to replenish his health with potions after that brutal battle, which was now bordering close to zero. It felt like he was only two hits away from dying again. So he has to be extra careful when passing through the Redskirts' valleys. Luckily for him, the pathway he was treading on was extremely wide. And the mobs were few and far between but still close enough to prevent the use of fast travel. This was so much better compared to the respawn area where it was cramped as hell and chock full of enemies.

It took West half an hour to traverse this path to reach the exit, but at least he was finally there. Just a couple of meters away from leaving the Redskirts for good and entering the Middle Barrens. And as West got closer, he spotted another player who just entered the Redskirts zone. From the way he was dressed, a body fit leather armor, and a pair of daggers sheathed on both sides of his leg, it was safe to assume that this player's class was rogue. The username above his head state that he's called "Maxximum" in-game. When he saw West, he waved a hand in greeting. But he quickly lowered it when he caught on to West's current condition. And as West continued to walk, he could feel his knees getting weak by the second. A yellow exclamation point appeared on his UI's logo. He opened it and saw the exclamation point was on his status menu. He checked his status and found out that he was experiencing fatigue! He didn't even know that stuff like this could happen in the game. His body was begging him to lay down and take a break, but he shook the urge away and soldiered on.

"Hey buddy, are you okay?" Maxximum asked as he approached West.

"I'm fine. Just leave me alone." West replied sharply.

"You know I can't do that." Maxximum said.

West glared at him. "Why?"

"Because I've been looking for players to kill, and you're my catch of the day."