Day 7: Boss Raid

For all of day 6, Samuel and his seven familiars had hunted monsters without an hour of rest, which resulted in the seven reaching level nine and falling asleep almost instantly once they got back to the base. Samuel was unsure about if his pets had distributed theor stats, but he had yet to do so. They would not reawaken until noon of the seventh day of the apocalypse.

Samuel would wake up to see Zhang staring him in the face.

"You mute or something? How long have you been here?" Samuel asked.

Zhang responded by raising his hand and spreading his fingers.

"Five minutes? Let's get going."

Samuel packed his seven companions into the pocket dimension, before following Zhang, who rode an impressive red motorbike to the meeting location. It was loud and very attention grabbing, unlike its silent owner, but Samuel was still very impressed with it and how the kid drove it.

Some monsters had revealed themselves, wanting to find out the source of the noise, but they were all killed by Zhang's chains that moved to his will. Once they got there, Zhang put his foot on the ground, making the motorbike slide before he came to a halt.

"Zhang, Sam, you're both finally here. I'll give you a quick briefing of today's target."

Jin brought the two to a rooftop and pointed to a singular beast sleeping five hundred metres away, which was the Black Blaze Bear, which was the strongest beast among those Samuel had found during his second day.

"Deal's off. I thought you were hunting something simpler like the Red-Furred Wolf or the Armored Jaguar, but 3B? You must be insane to pick a fight with that."

"Come on now, Sammy, help a brother out."

"Pay me properly then."

"Three uncommon items."

"Seven."

"Five."

The other members had no idea why their boss was going so far in dealing with a man whose powers were barely known. The few that had seen what happened yesterday were unsure if the bear was even affected by mental attacks. While those few speculated, the men and women that were in the boss' party yesterday knew about Samuel's strength, along with the beast he controlled.

"You're either gonna work with me properly, Jin, or you can deal with it on your own."

"Five uncommon items, and a common curse skill book."

"Deal."

"What's your plan, then, big boss?"

"You wake it up with your water magic and keep it still with your mask off, while the rest of us attack and weaken it, then Zhang restricts it."

*Doesn't sound like the most solid plan to me.*

"How do you ensure my safety in this plan?"

"You'll be put in a party with four other people— two tanks, a damage dealer, and a healer. I'll join the fight as well."

Samuel didn't know how much he could trust Jin, but he decided to go along with his plan. Jin quickly brought him to meet the other four people.

"These two are the tanks, Flynn and Eli. You met them yesterday when they were guarding the door." Jin said while pointing to a man of average height with black hair tied into ponytail and another taller guy with brown hair, bulging muscles and a bushy beard. The two were understandably wary of Samuel, but they still shook his hand out of respect for their boss.

"The edgelord in the witch hat in the back is Ashton." He said while pointing to a young man not even fifteen years old sitting far away from everyone else who only gave a nod in response.

"Where's Augusta? She didn't oversleep again, did she?" Jin asked, only to see his subordinates remain silent. He gave a loud groan before looking back at Samuel. "Sorry, give me a moment to go get her, and the items I promised you."

Samuel took a seat on the floor to check his status screen, deciding to use his undistributed stat points.

[Name: Samuel Zaya.

Titles (no effect): Chicken bastard, Fujin, Boss.

Age: 23 years old.

Level: 9.

Status: Well-rested. Hungry. Cursed.

Achievements: {Press to check your achievements}

Stats:

Strength: 25 => 40.

Agility: 25 => 40.

Vitality: 27=> 50.

Intelligence: 40 => 60.

Magic: 55 => 65.

Stamina: 23 => 30.

Control: 20=> 20.

Skills:

Magic Manipulation Lv. 25 {Common} (Evolvable)

Unarmed Mastery Lv. 4 {Common}

Feather Storm Lv. 25 {Common} (Evolvable)

Dragon Master's Magic Lv. 1 {Mythical}

Evil Eye Lv. 1 {Unique}

Dragon Blood Lv. 1 {Mythical}

Dragon Fear Lv.1 {Epic}

Ultimate Fusion {Special Rank} Lv. 1]

Samuel wanted to focus on one stat for his distribution, but the system warned him against it, saying that he needed to level up other stats to not risk health problems. Samuel also noticed that the increase in stats had decreased in power once he was over 35 in his stats. With his current stats, Samuel could lift up a two tons when he wasn't flying, run at a speed of 80km/h for, and run several calculations in his mind at the same time. He couldn't check his stamina and vitality, because he had no way of doing so yet.

Seeing that Jin still wasn't back by the time he was done, he decided to read the skills that he had yet to read.

[Dragon Master's Magic Lv. 1 {Mythical}: Grants the user access to manipulating the elements of fire, earth, wind, water, light, dark, time, and space.

Restrictions:

1. Time and space magic depend on the scale of the magic's use.

2. The stronger the enemy, the more magic used when you use time magic.]

Samuel had thought that the eight elements were fire, water, earth, wind, lightning, plant, light, and shadow, but the fact that he could manipulate time and space justified its mythical rating.

"What does that first restriction mean, system?"

[If you were to use time magic to rewind your whole world's time, it would be different from rewinding time to heal yourself.]

"Oh so basically common sense."

Seeing the system remain silent, Samuel knew that it was embarassed, but he didn't bother talking with it.

[Dragon Blood Lv. 1 {Mythical}: Boosts your magic damage by 20%, and makes you immune to all biological diseases, along with some poisons.]

[Dragon Fear Lv.1 {Epic}: By the authority of the dragon blood, you may cause fear to all enemies at Elite rank or lower. Weakened effect on enemies higher than elite rank.]

Samuel wanted to check his evolvable skills, but he saw Jin and a tall woman dressed in bone armor wielding a one-edged greatsword bickering as they got closer to the others, who got up to prepare for their fight.

"Samuel, this is-"

"I'm Augusta, winged boy. Don't be hinderin' me in the fight." The girl's voice was brash and accented, which made it obvious that she wasn't a native, just like him. Samuel almost wanted to take off his mask, but Jin grabbed his hand and shook his head. "What? You think you're pretty 'nuff to change my mind?"

Samuel turned to look at Jin, who could only nervously smile as he shouted. "Alright! Let's stop bickering! We start immediately!"

Samuel walked alongside the other four people he was assigned to be with, stopping about a hundred metres away from the bear.

"Why are we stopping so far away?"

"Its high damage attacks can't reach us here, and it wakes up when we're within 50 metres of it. Wait for the boss' signal to begin the attack."

Less than a minute later, a familiar voice appeared in his head.

'Begi- good god what is going on in your head?!'

*New guy?*

*Out! Out! Out!*

*Raid his mind!*

'Cut the connection if you want to spend your days in peace.'

The connection was cut immediately, and spell circles began to appear around Samuel, firing several water balls at the bear that awoke with a loud roar, charging in the caster's direction. That very same caster took off his mask, charging at it with his wings spread open and his face fully visible.

The bear let out a scared roar, trying to run away from Samuel with an expression of terror on its face, too bad for it that Samuel wasn't alone, with several other people charging it, wanting to attack it. It raised its front legs, preparing to cast a large area attack, only to find itself slowed by the faceless winged being's time magic, who took advantage of its current situation to hit its head with his powerful arms, using the momentum from flight, along with a swipe of his wings wounding one of its shoulders.

With no fear of being interrupted, the others attacked like they were breaking open a piñata, which chewed through its health more and more. But Samuel suddenly had an immense feeling of dread, which made him want to retreat, and the system only affirmed his fear.

[Dragon Blood Lv. 1 warns you to retreat immediately.]

Samuel didn't have any time to think, changing his wings back into flight mode and spreading them open to take to the skies at an insane speed. The keen few among the others noticed Samuel leave in a hurry, not in the direction of his base or to the temporary outpost they set up for a break, but to the skies with incredible haste, as if he were struck by an immense fear and soon followed suit, running to the highest point they could get to before the time magic was undone due to its caster having gone too far. Those greedy for merits, and the ones not quite quick enough to reach far enough away from the bear, were all suddenly engulfed in a volcanic eruption that spread high into the sky, as if aiming to claim a certain flying being's life, before it came crashing back down, and spread on the streets like a flood.

[The Black Blaze Bear evolves in a moment of rage into a Magmatic Bear.]