36 The Might of the Duke!

The Ghasts almost trampled Axel with their heavy dancing which tip toed from one foot to another. Although they tried to smack Axel with Dual Aggro, Axel quickly used 'Crisis Escape' and transformed into a signpost. This skill was one of the hero skills stemming off of the Treasure Hunter Ace Talent. It was a rare hidden skill in the game which allowed the player to take off aggro from monsters for an period of time by transforming into an inanimate object. The duration of the transformation is longer as the skill rank goes up accordingly. While it did not seem like a flashy skill at all, it was a life-saving skill that allowed many end game players like Axel to take a breath from the imminent dangers in the middle of combat. No matter how strong Axel was, facing multiple Ghasts, and a full army of ghosts summoned by the Banshee was not a smart idea.

"Hmm, after this room, it should be the Duke boss....Let's use this skill early on then!" Axel thought to himself.

In a few seconds, the transformation timed out, and Axel returned to normal. Without hesitating, he transformed into a Demigod and activated 'Wings of Eclipse.' This was a demigod skill part of Morrighan's ability branch. It allows the player to call upon shadow crows to form an invincible barrier surrounding the player. This barrier is equivalent to having 'Heavy Stander', 'Mana Deflector', and 'Natural Shield'. Essentially all damage taken will be reduced to 1 or less damage per hit. The barrier would be active as long as there was enough experience points stored inside which could be recharged by normally leveling.

Now that the aggro had returned, all the Ghasts and ghosts clawed at Axel as if he was a dummy target. The numbers of attacks per second was so great that one could not see what had happened with the naked eye. However, with the help of 'Wings of Eclipse', Axel was taking little to no damage.

In a single breath, he activated 'Bash' and spammed it on the first Ghast nearby.

"Kch! Kch! Kch! Kch! Kch!"

Five consecutive blows struck the Ghast and it was down. Axel repeated this process for the remaining monsters in this wave. The Banshee was no exception as her petrifaction skill was nullified by the long stun effect of the 'Bash' skill.

The next few waves were a back and forth cycle between Armored Gremlins, Ghasts, and Banshees. In a few minutes, the third room was cleared.

At this time, Axel deactivated 'Wings of Eclispe'. He didn't want to rely on this constantly as the experience points stored inside the skill would take a long time to recharge after all.

The next room was the boss room, and Axel thought it would be a piece of cake. If it's anything, Axel's pinpointed focus in melee combat could overpower almost every existence in the game of Mabinogi. The only exception were monsters that had immunities to melee, in which Axel would use his sub class which was magic or archery to deal with that if it came up.

As he quickly entered inside the boss room, the dungeon door behind him shut down, and a majestic, vampiric man in a noble's overall floated in mid-air. His skin paled like ocean waters, and his long white hair seemed to make the aura around him chill.

This boss was not anything new to Axel. In the past when the Abyss Advanced dungeons were first released in the game, he was able to clear it with a full party of average players then. The only reason he even joined that party in the first place was due to the fact that he did not have a dungeon pass at the time. Not to mention, it was beneficial to have a few meatshields to take the extra aggro in case things went south. In the end, almost all the party members in that dungeon run were knocked unconcious at the boss fight, and Axel had to solo the Duke.

Seeing this familiar figure, Axel felt somewhat nostalgic. Everything in the new world he had reincarnated into was so backwards in the progression of the storyline of the game that he felt somewhat awkward fighting in there at first. Even if this was a dream, he wanted to enjoy this feeling of euphoria while using his end game skills to the max. At this moment, Axel used 'Battlefield Overture' which was a bard buff skill that could increase one's minimum and maximum melee damage by a certain percentage. Since he was maxed out in every skill, he could sing the skill out without an instrument, and it increased his melee damage by 28%.

The Duke seemed to have noticed Axel and slowly floated over to Axel. It seemed as if it was waiting for this human to attack him first. In return, Axel took the bait and attacked the Duke first. He used 'Charge' to rush up to him, and then used 'Rage Impact'. This skill unleashed a battle spirit that could cause a melee debuff to the exisiting target. At Rank 1, it caused the target to be hit with 50% more melee damage for a duration of 10 seconds. Axel did not waste this chance and summoned 'Judgement Blade', a divine silver blade several times the size of his height over his head and launched it towards the Duke.

'Judgement Blade' was a Crusader Skill that one acquired after finishing Generation 19. It is mainly used used to slay Apostles but it is also considered the strongest one hit attack for melee users in the game. The Duke did not seemed to be fazed by the attack as the attack did not push it back, but it was due to having 'Advanced Heavy Stander', which meant that it was immune to stun and knockback attacks.

Despite being like a immobile fortress, roughly half of its 538,010 health points had dropped. If it did not have such a high defense, it would have probably been killed in one hit by Axel's 'Judgement Blade'.

"Whooooooossssh!"

Sensing the dangerous aura from Axel, the Duke created a black pit in the ground and dropped below, teleporting away using 'Duke's Mist'. Although it was similar to the monster only skill, 'Teleportation', it possessed an undead curse with a murky air particles that can lower one's defense and inflict 'Bloody Duke' when a player is near the vicinity of it. 'Bloody Duke' can knock the player unconcious if the player comes near the range of 'Duke's Mist'.

Right as Axel was about to follow the Duke, it disappeared! He felt a sense of panic when he felt some movements behind his back...