97 Without me you are nothing

The monsters we encountered in the instance did not change much from the first monster we encountered. Because of their advanced ability to hide the monsters were rather difficult to deal with. This was easily countered by bailey's senses.

Her stats may have been low, but her sense of perception was off the charts. It was apparently a class skill she had gotten when she took the class. As of right now it was only useful on rank D or below, which is why she was unable to sense me.

The skill was called [Heightened Senses] and was a skill that got stronger as she did. It gave her an additional stat called perception and gained an additional point every time she leveled up. Unfortunately, as she was still technically level one the score was still only at 1. With a score of 1 if she were actively paying attention, she could spot a level D or below beast that was hidden.

I managed to get a good look at the beasts, they were called [Snow Rays] and as you can imagine they looked like sting rays back on earth. Their tails however were much closer to that of a scorpion, from it dripped a cold essence poison. Their bodies had weird adaptions that allowed them to swim through the snow as if it were water and could even float above the snow for a short period of time.

They were once again a creature that focused on ambushes, but they were much more proficient than the worms I had encountered before were. If I had been alone, I would have fallen victim to their sneak attacks on more than one occasion. Thankfully, Bailey was able to spot these creatures with relative ease.

The floor ended with a mini boss. It was a much larger version of the Rays we had encountered earlier. It was so large that we ended up fighting on its body. We had to constantly dodge its tail attacks while it carried us through the air.

When we finally defeated the large ray, we were transported to the second floor. Not before we fell several thousand feet from the sky that is. The portal appeared right before we hit the ground, and would enter the top 10 scariest instances I had ever been in.

The second floor of the instance was underground in a series of frozen caverns. There was not a sign of the rays from the first floor, but instead we encountered a species of bear that seemed to thrive in the environment. They had a large amount of muscle and flesh that protected them from the cold and seemed to have developed an immunity of sorts to the freezing atmosphere.

The scariest part of fighting them was not their massively high constitution or vitality, nor was it the strength they carried in their attacks. The scariest thing about them was that they had an ice breath weapon that could freeze a creature in a block of ice.

Thanks to my relatively high constitution when I was struck it only managed to slow me down and make my body stiff. The same could not be said for Bailey. She had been hit several times, and her skin began to turn a nasty blue and black. I unfortunately had no way to warm her other than by using my own body heat.

The experience was awkward for both of us. For me it was awkward because she was attractive, and her hands needed to be on the warmest parts of my body. For her it was awkward because... she did not seem very awkward, but her face turned a shade of red that I had not seen in a long time.

The bears were a pain, and it would take more than 10 shots to take down. This was enough time for them to counterattack several times, and always enough time for them to unleash their breath weapon on us.

The more were attacked with the breath attacks the less space there was for her to place her hands. Eventually she could only place them in a place that had become extremely excited from the constant touching. Both of our faces turned bright red, and we were unable to make eye contact after that.

We eventually pulled through but decided to rest before we got to the boss. We ended up wasting over an hour waiting for heat to be restored to our bodies before we continued.

The boss is exactly as you would expect, it was a large version of the bear. Only this bear had three different heads. The bear was massive, one of its legs was thicker than Bailey and I combined. It stood over 5 meters tall while on all fours.

The bear looked at us as if we were not even worth being a snack. It started the fight with all three of the heads using its breath attack. Thankfully, we were out of the lethal range, and with some effort were able to escape from the blast.

We let out a collective sigh, our experience told us that the bears breath had a cool down period. This would be our window to attack.

I did not rush forward. There was no need to. Using my pistols, I was able to bombard the bear from a distance. If the bear approached me to closely, I would enter stealth and move away. Fighting like this was rather annoying for me. My damage was reduced by a lot by constantly having to be out in the open, but I had no choice. The moment I entered stealth the bear would rush towards Bailey who could only run for her life before the onslaught.

I had been forced several times to intercept the attacks, which resulted in countless injuries appearing over my body. The claws of the beast were rather intense and had cut straight through my clothes into my flesh. The cuts were extremely deep and managed to show off my innards.

My self-repairing clothes had taken far too much damage in such a small amount of time and were unable to keep up with the damage. They soon hung on my body in shreds, the magic power completely drained from them. The only articles of clothing that managed to survive were my magical set of lingerie and my cloak.

I must have been an odd sight because Bailey kept staring at my body. The exhaustion of the fight must have really gotten to her. She was breathing g extremely heavy and her face was red from the constant movements.

We did not have the chance to rest, almost as if a timer had gone off the bear once again attacked with its breath attacks. This time one head was pointed at me, while another was pointed at Bailey. I was easily able to dodge the attack, but bailey could only stand there like a deer in headlights.

I cursed to myself as I shadow stepped in front of her. I shielded her body as I shadow stepped away again. I could feel my body begging to freeze. My muscles became stiff, and my teeth kept chattering.

Fortunately, I was able to move. My speed had been reduced to only a fourth of what it was normally, which put me only slightly above the massive bear in front of us.

The battle became far more intense from then on. I was unable to leave Bailey alone, so I was forced to narrowly dodge the bears attacks. Soon it became angry and swung its massive claws at me while its third head released the final breath attack it had been saving.

Thankfully, I was prepared, when I managed to see the attack coming before it happened, and shadow stepped with Bailey to the other end of the cave.

I never stopped using my bullets to attack, but the massive bear seemed to have no end of vitality. The bullet wounds I caused would heal in a matter of seconds. I grit my teeth. I knew I no longer had a choice. I used the moment I had to switch out my weapons. I am sorry mom I tried, I really tried. But this time I have no choice.

For a while I continued to play a game of cat and mouse with the bear, but I was only biding my time. The bear became furious, its movements were much more powerful, much faster as the fight went on. The expression on its face told it all. How dare these creatures who were not even worthy to be my snack make me work so hard.

An ice blue glow formed around the creature's mouth. I knew the timer had disappeared, and with it my chance to attack had come. In the moment when it opened its mouth, as it was gathering energy, I moved. I shadow stepped to the shadow on its face that had formed from the light of its own attack. Several grenades entered either of my hands. I did not hesitate to throw them I to the bears open mouths.

The subzero temperatures of the breath attack immediately began to freeze my flesh. The feeling was scalding as my skin began to turn black. The pain only lasted the briefest of moments.

I did not even have time to shadow step away before the grenades exploded. The massive explosion flung me away at a speed that even I could not hope to normally reach. The burning in my arms stopped as a massive amount of vampiric healing energy rushed into my being, healing the wounds I received.

The last thing I saw before I blacked out was a small goblin with a large pointy hat looking down on me. The sinister green on his skeletal face seemed to shine with the meaning. "Without me you are nothing".