37 Tier-Two

"Stanis, hold the other one off. You two kill the little ones and then help" shouted Tanya in a hurry, not daring to take the Large Zelt's momentum-filled attack standing as she herself ran towards it. It was not wrong to say that her shortsword was leaking mana, the whole blade imbued with far too much.

Stanis trusted her to kill the large male Zelt quickly and thus he was fine with holding of the other for a short while. Therefore he too ran alongside her, dodging the jaws of the male Zelt by the breadth of a hair as he dashed towards the female.

Both of the large Zelts were absolutely furious at the countless Zelt corpses lying on the ground, and so were both in frenzy, uncaring about any injury they would befall as long as these Humans died by their jaws.

The female Zelt bit at him, although to no avail as Stanis punched its snout with his left arm, his right arm already going in for a strike. Unfortunately for him, this Zelt was no amateur and immediately tilted its head away from the blade, instead using its body to take the hit.

When Stanis had fought the little Zelts, his first thought had been how their outer body was like stone, but he had also felt like he had a hammer to break through it. The large Zelt's outer body was also like stone, but now he was given a dagger to break through it rather than a hammer. His strike made a light wound but nothing else as the female Zelt lashed out once again, Stanis barely managing to roll out of the way.

To his side Tanya was fighting a whole another battle, the male Zelt being the one struggling instead of her. It had started off with the viciousness and fury the female Zelt still had, but that soon turned into fear and anxiousness after its first wound. Her sword had started its flesh after stabbing, causing the area surrounding to break out into acute stings. In response to this, its body had instinctively cramped the whole area due to the stings, but this was not in the least a good condition to have in a fight. It had been stabbed near the leg and now its left hind leg was convulsing and cramping, even worse than a limp.

And yet that wasn't even the worst part, instead it was the fact that this Human in front of it didn't seem at all satisfied with the damage she had already caused, instead she moved with greater speed and savagery than before.

On the other side of the Cavern was another losing battle for the Zelts, Jayesh and Scowly effectively massacring the little ones. The two of them had killed enough little Zelts to now know the best method, and this showed as the number of small Zelts remaining went down from ten to four within seconds.

Thus Stanis was the only one struggling, his sinews not supple enough to easily dodge the female Zelt, his body not strong enough to take its hits and his arms not powerful enough to even hurt the beast…

He used his blade to catch the Zelt's swiping claws, only to realise its surprise attack too late as it viciously head-butted him, sending him sprawling to the ground in agony. His stomach lurched and rolled, making it difficult for him to find his bearings as the Zelt bit into his right arm, tearing a good chunk of flesh out.

The difference between getting cut or hit and getting flesh torn out of you is like night and day, Stanis's body going into overdrive as he suddenly grew very angry and scared at the same time. The female Zelt would give him no time though, already in sprint. He needed to change how he fought, otherwise he would be dead or at least limbless by the time Tanya made her way here. This thought led to a question; how could he change his battle-style? This question rang in his head, his mind instantly giving an answer that was of little help: attack its weak points. That was true and all but what weak points? Its whole outer body was made out of steel, only its inner flesh was damageable and he wouldn't even be in this predicament if he could cut that deep.

The female Zelt was on him before he could think anymore, but its charge was unsuccessful as Stanis merely threw it off, his anger working charms while his fear made him run the opposite direction to gain some distance.

Its senses! That's how he should attack: by damaging its senses. He could hear it growling like a truck as it once again ran towards him, its blood-stained jaws wide open. He only had a short moment to sigh before he set his mind, he would need to risk it in order to win it.

And so he charged towards it, its mouth wide open while his sword bore down. But that was just a distraction, instead it was as it tilted its head in fear that his left arm came into play, jamming down its throat. His red claws became crimson red inside as it scratched the walls of the female Zelt's mouth, before clawing the tongue and failing to get his hand out before its jaws shut tight.

The dark-orange skin had been scraped off his forearm, leaving a bloody mess of an arm behind. But it was worth it as he had come out on top, the female Zelt now going into an irrational frenzy as it bit into the ground, banged its head and even cried as it begged for the pain to go away. Being the magnanimous person he was, Stanis was more than willing to do this as he chopped towards the beast's neck, taking six full swipes before the head lopped down.

Having finally killed the bastard of a monster, Stanis wearily scanned his surroundings, hoping that all the fights were now done and won as he had no remaining energy inside of him. He had finished in just the nick of time to see Tanya's opponent sprawling on the floor, its whole body riddled with sparse but deep holes, before it moved no longer as her short sword kissed its head goodnight.

As for the other fight, Jayesh and Scowly had finished as he had and were sitting in the blood, far too exhausted to care, nevertheless get up.

There was no sound except the groans of agony and the frantic breathing, both being common among all four Humans. It wasn't until close to a minute had passed that Tanya regained her breath, her lithe figure covered with just as much blood as the others. She broke the partial-silence by saying,

"I think we can rest—"

Before she even finished her sentence, Jayesh grunted in approval, quickly followed by the other two.

She was far too tired to get angry or exasperated and so just carried on, "This is the furthest we've come during the previous raids. Alyona has guessed from the information we have from the other camps that there should, hopefully, only be a final boss-type monster left."

Stanis responded, usually too intimidated by Tanya's suspicions to talk against the Classer, but now far too much in pain to care,

"I don't care how many enemies are left, all I know is that they'll only get stronger past here and I sure as hell ain't going to face anything stronger with just you three beside me."

This was half an insult, especially towards Tanya who believed herself to be strong, but instead of arguing with him, the other three once again grunted in unison. What he said was only the truth; they were far too sane to do such an insane thing such as facing a tier-two Zelt with just four Humans, and they'd be damned if any of the others forced them to do so!

Close to an hour passed before the next group finally made their way into the cavern. In that time, Tanya had distributed some of the healing pots she had which the others hadn't the chance to get yet. Stanis was actually beginning to see this girl in a good light, it seemed they had only gotten off to a bad start due to a misunderstanding. This feeling was reciprocated by Tanya, after all strength was something that you couldn't not respect, especially when a person was strong enough to kill a tier-one Zelt solo despite not being a classer.

Stanis hadn't regenerated much mana in the time and thus was only able to lightly heal the torn flesh from his right arm and the scraped skin from his left forearm. Neither injury had been completely reversed, but it was as good as he could get. He considered using destructive mana recharge but decided it wasn't worth it.

After Tanya had threatened him in the Forest, the last thing he had done before leaving was to use destructive mana recharge. By chance, he had been near the hare's corpse and thus had seen the effect it could have on living bodies. Best said, it was better used as an ace in a fight rather than to just gain some quick mana.

He had also considered taking off the veils of darkness around his arms, so that it would give him back four mana and one extra in regen/per hour. However he eventually decided against this. He hadn't used it in his fight against the female Zelt but that was because he was far too much in pain and not confident enough to use it in that state. However this didn't take away from the strength his darkness manipulation could have after a bit more practice.

The first group to join them had three people remaining, all were battered, bruised and bloody on top of that. The next group had five, then two and finally another four. This meant there were fifteen people in the cavern overall, having come from four of the smaller tunnels.

After a bit of time, Tanya, who became the designated leader as she was the only Classer here, told the four most battered people to split up and walk back down the two tunnels through which no one had come walked out off. Worst case scenario was that all the people there were dead and the two walking back through it would also die. Best case would be that the groups are too injured to move, and thus the two walking back can save their lives.

Having had hours to rest, Stanis had already healed his injuries into bruises and done the same for the others with the worst of wounds. It was, however, after using Light healing a dozen times that he felt a headache coming. This seemed to be the after-effect of using Light healing far too many times in a short period, and so he stopped healing the others in order to keep the after-effects low. This sprouted a bit of dissent, but nothing that was worth fighting over.

The eleven remaining people walked through the large tunnel, the tunnel being so big that all eleven could walk adjacent to each other with room to spare. About an hour of walking and two groups of small Zelts massacred later, the Humans made it to an even larger cavern than before.

It was similar to the last one with large stalactites hanging down, shining a glow onto the water which was then reflected, lighting up the whole room.

Tanya instantly barked out orders,

"Me, Stanis and Travis will hold off the big one. The rest of you kill the others and rush to help. Don't fuck this up!". Her voice was harsher than before, but it also hinted fear as it was trembling.

In front of them were five tier-one Zelts alike the one Stanis had fought, and in the centre of the deepest pool was a Zelt who stood on his hind legs. He smirked as he heard Tanya talk, before calmly walking out of the pool as the tier-ones rushed to support him.

"Burrrn my ccave into yor mmemories, Humans. Thisss willl be yor last sight!"

His tone was distasteful, not at hiding the disdain for he held for Humans. He was 6'5, taller than the tallest Humans here, and had a body made of bulging muscles.

If this was a step-up in difficulty, Stanis guessed that this Zelt was a tier-two. However he heavily doubted that this would be anywhere as easy as killing the Goblin mage had been…