35 The Tunnel

From a quick glance, Stanis counted close to half the Village's population hiking up the Mountain. It seemed Alyona was truly serious about completely destroying the monsters in the Mountain this time.

Stanis also very quickly noticed that the blonde girl, whose name turned out to be Tanya, was a big-shot in the Village. Her claim to fame? Turns out she was one of the five Classers in the Village… And even better, she was not at all well-disposed towards him in the least as Stanis and his whole group quickly figured out from her glares.

Eventually, Jayesh slipped from the front of the group towards the back where Stanis was.

"Hey mate, why has she been glaring at you all this time? You do something to her?" whispered Jayesh, the last question rolling distastefully off his tongue. The glares she had given him weren't the irritated type, rather distasteful and soaked with suspicion.

"I don't know, I haven't done anything. I only met her yesterday in the Forest!" whispered back Stanis, claiming his innocence. His innocence wasn't very well received, especially as the very topic of the conversation tilted back her head, giving a glance of mild fury as her eyebrows scrunched up.

It was almost like a charge of electricity had just zapped through his body as Stanis felt a shock and a sudden moment of danger, until she tilted her head back forwards. Fucking Jayesh, getting him into trouble…

He stole Tanya's glare and showed it to Jayesh, who merely crossed his arms in innocence before saying, "I'm not the one she's glaring at."

He was speechless as he heard this, his own friend attacking him with the very thing that they were just heartfully talking about a second back. Jayesh then began looking around, almost as if distancing himself from Stanis as he didn't want to be on a Classer's bad side like Stanis already was.

After tripping up Jayesh, Stanis was satisfied and also began looking around. He could see Orena in a group of big shots, all who looked strong from a single glance. Alyona was also in that group and so it seemed she had cajoled Orena in. He guessed that the other Classer was also in that group, although he couldn't tell which one it was. On the other hand, Stanis had not caught a single glimpse of David or Caleb ever since coming to the Village yesterday. That wasn't that surprising but the fact that they weren't on this raid did slightly confuse him.

After roughly looking at everyone here, Stanis estimated he was above mid-way in terms of strength. Of course he would be able to take down the strongest, apart from the Classers, in 1vs1s using Layman's Rush, but that was also a skill he would rather not use. Tanya was a Classer to do with the bow and so Stanis was pretty sure he would be able to take her down, especially in enclosed spaces like the tunnels.

After about an hour of hiking, they were finally near the tunnels. The Mountain was by no stretch a large one but it was quite steep and so everyone was forced into single-file down a thin pathway.

Eventually they reached the tunnels, which there were about 30 of. Each tunnel was about as wide as five men and as tall as a single one, with all of them apparently leading to the same place. Thus every group chose a tunnel, before venturing inwards.

Stanis should have known beforehand but he was surprised as he saw that it was close to pitch-black inside of the tunnel. His night-vision allowed him to see like it was bright inside, but he was confused as to how the other four would cope in this type of darkness. His question was quickly answered as Tanya brought out a torch from her backpack, which she lit before handing over to Stanis. This was to be expected as he was the only one with a free hand, but Stanis felt that her accompanying message was just not necessary.

"Use your left-arm for the good of us Humans…"

Her sharp tone and the tension in the environment stopped Stanis from any rebuttal, but he was sure to remember this for a later date…

They slowly walked through the tunnel, although this seemed an unnecessary precaution for the most part as they continued walking undisturbed for close to 20 minutes. It was also in this time that Stanis found that the torch in his hand wasn't actually burning out fast, instead it seemed the oil drizzled over it was some special type.

Stanis was almost, admittedly foolishly, relaxed when he heard the first foreign sounds. The first sound he heard was a very distant chirrup that echoed through the whole tunnel, followed by rapid clicks. This call was then responded to by a few others, immediately causing Stanis to tense up. Other matters had made him forget to do so, but he suddenly remembered about Scout and Sense.

He drained six mana as he did so, unwilling to take any risks. And it was fully worth it as he could see about five monsters coming down the tunnel and almost double that coming from below them…

Stanis immediately told the others, who were not pleased to hear the news. The others had forgotten alongside him about his skill, but Tanya seemed further irritated that he hadn't used such a valuable skill all this time…

Stanis ignored the annoying girl and instead looked at the monsters rapidly approaching through his mind's eye. They were running on all fours towards them, their sleek and muscled bodies giving them the confidence to run at a rapid pace. Their bodies were covered in short hairs and they had long claws, claws much longer than what the Wolves had.

He no longer had any time to leisurely watch the monsters as he saw the first one in the distance, followed by several others. His whole group had already backtracked quite a few steps in order to avoid the ones that had been waiting directly below them, to which they would have been able to hear digging sounds from was it not for all of them entering battle mode.

They were arranged in a 2-2-1 formation, with Jayesh and Scowly at the front, followed by Stanis and Aaliyah and finally Tanya. Tanya nocked an arrow, before releasing it towards the monsters in front. Stanis now understood why he had felt an awful pressure push down on him when she had threatened him yesterday as the arrow sliced through the air as it passed, quickly lodging itself within the head of a monster.

"CRAARRGH"

It growled and winced in pain momentarily, but didn't stop itself from carrying on the charge, albeit now slower than its counterparts. Tanya rapidly nocked more arrows, two more shooting out before the frontrunners made impact.

Jayesh roared as he knocked one into the air, before bashing it back down with his club. Scowly did a similar thing, although with less success as his opponent managed to dodge his strike. They were soon met with three more as Stanis and Aaliyah stood their ground, fully aware of the many more that would soon be popping out of the ground.

Stanis used Scout and Sense once more, only to see that one of the monsters was just about to pop out of the ground in front of him.

He swung his sword with perfect timing as the blade slashed across its face. It was as his blade met flesh that Stanis realised it was more like blade meeting stone than anything else. This would explain why the Village hadn't cleared this Camp of monsters yet.

He stepped back as he avoided the claws of an emerging one, before swinging his sword once more. The sounds of combat made a cacophony as the thumps, groans and growls made quite the awful orchestra.

It was about 30 seconds deep in the fighting that Stanis heard a high pitched scream from next to him, only to tilt his head to see Aaliyah on the ground. There were four of the monsters clawing at her feet and crawling across her downed body, some of whom doing so despite having arrows lodging out of them.

He had already stepped several paces backwards and so his opponents were running to catch him, allowing him a second to watch as an arrow imbued with mana pierced through the whole body of a monster, and then through another one, before causing both of them to go flying off Aaliyah. The other two monsters crawling on her instantly went on guard, although too late as two more arrows shot out, one getting a headshot whereas the other one penetrated through a set of claws.

Stanis only had two monsters left after having a killed his first a few seconds ago, and so he brought his attention back to his fight as he stepped forward, his sword already in motion. One swing slashed through ribs, whereas the next was caught by a set of claws. But that was easily fixed as he punted the monster across its head, before ending the life of the slashed one.

What proceeded was a clean-up as he and Tanya helped the other three, all the monsters dead or close to after a few seconds had passed.

Next chapter