51 (51) Awakening Advancement

It was the eleventh month and in a five-floor dungeon, the sounds of intense battles could be heard from every single floor. This dungeon was famous on a national scale and the once quiet town was brimming with activity.

This Dungeon was considered as a gold-mine. Not only because of the valuable loot the monsters dropped, but also as the dungeon itself was only silver-tier. This meant that there was no chance of permanent death, and sometimes wandering monsters would be drawn to the First Floor.

These monsters were only temporary monsters which seeked refuge in the dungeon. They were drawn to the aura of silver-tier dungeons and above. The higher the tier, level and aura, the higher the chance of rarer monsters being called over.

At this moment, luck had befallen onto the players as an elite, rare monster had taken residency. Even without the presence of this monster though, the Dungeon would still attract thousands of players each week.

In the Fifth Floor, a triad of Bosses were ruthlessly beating up an arrogant party of players who wore shining, gold armour. The party belonged to the fourth son of a second-rate noble.

He had shamelessly tried to court the daughter of one of the Major Families, in response she had announced on the public channel, that if he were to beat a certain named dungeon, then she will accept his courting.

This had caused an international sensation as even those from the far East would want to marry into a Major Family.

The Noble's family suddenly started to invest in the fourth son after this declaration, they had used all their assets too buy the golden armour the party was currently wearing.

However, they would never have imagined what had happened in the Dungeon.

The battle had been going on for over an hour, and the arrogant part had realised that there were being played with. Every ten minutes, the three Bosses rotate their formation; there would always be two Bosses fighting on the frontline, and the third would be lazing at the back, only attacking once they had been attacked.

Currently, the Boss lazing about was a large, hairy being who stood twice the size of an average human. This Boss was named Kraton. He could be called the leader of the Dungeon, having owned the place for nearly 40 years. Kraton, however, was not the strongest of the three Bosses.

The five humans felt shame, anger and a multitude of other emotions when they were left in this bedraggled state. But for their leader's own pride, they vowed to never surrender.

Yet, due to this devotion, the golden armour which they wore were already showing signs of breaking. The Bosses seemed to have purposefully attacked the armour with large, heavy strikes, rather than deadly, piercing lunges.

It was not long until one of the golden pieces of armour broke, and then another, and yet another.

When the first man had finally lost all his armour, a winged, serpentine figure dashed down from the air. Her two blades shone brightly, reflecting the light from the glowing crystals.

Bright red blood spurted into the air as the blades sliced through the man's neck. The daggers attacked so fast, that he had no chance to defend whatsoever.

This speed, this power, was on a whole different level than what the Lamia was showing before.

A Dark Knight was a powerful sub-class of the primary Knight class. Other than becoming a Guardian, and eventually a Paladin, a Knight could decide to not advance at level 10, but wait until level 25 to advance as a Dark Knight.

At level 50, they would advance again as a Dragon Knight. This line of advancement was very slow, but it made up for it in terms of strength and power. Dark Knights had the innate gift of hardened skin, bones and muscles, a second layer of armour.

Just before the players could react to the Dark Knight's death, the ten-minute rotation occured. Lysine slid back and rested on a large, carved out chair, whilst Kraton came forward with a huge grin plastered to his face.

Kraton joined the other Boss; if Kraton was to be called a giant, then the third Boss was a behemoth. This Boss was a large, crystal Golem. It was primarily colourless, but at the same time, full of every colour.

In a short time, the four men were stripped down to nothing but their Boxers. Killing these men was as easy as snapping one's finger. Once that happened, they all just disappeared as small white particles. Except for one.

The person left was of course the leader of the party. His arrogant features were morphed into fear and anger.

Outside the dungeon, there was a large crowd of players and non-players. If the Noble's son didn't return from the dungeon entrance and appeared from another place, then the whole world would know he failed, forcing him to eat all of his earlier remarks and bets.

The man's face was rather green at this moment. There was no doubt that he had lost against this dungeon, what was more, all the armour was destroyed.

This armour was a Diamond and Gold Quality, level 40 equipment. Although he was only level 30, his family wanted to make sure he defeated the dungeon. Yet, now that the armour was beyond scraps, they couldn't even sell it to reclaim some money back!

The Noble's family was most likely to be a noble no more when the fourth son returned. His whole family would blame him, a convenient scapegoat. He would then be cast aside, no longer identified as a Noble's son.

Why had everything gone wrong?!

Kraton bent down right in front the stripped man, his fanged smile was scary to the young lad, like a beast about to devour its prey.

Kraton himself was excited, after killing this party without taking much damage at all, he should have reached level 30! This was the required level to be an intermediate Boss, as well as being a major milestone for all Bosses.

At level 10, specialisation occurs. And at level 30, a similar thing happens. This stage was called awakening. Awakening seemed to be based of the monsters' specialisation and species.

An example would be the Nagas. Most Nagas would specialise in speed or power, at level 30, research showed that they would experience something similar to the Gargoyles' evolution.

This advancement would promote the Nagas to the next stage: the humans and other players often categorised them as 'Agile Nagas' or 'Brawny Nagas'.

If a Naga were to specialise completely different from any known Naga, whether this be with the help of a mutation, talent or extreme hard effort, they would often be classed as a sub-species, or an elite mutant.

Some species would even receive a full evolution at this level, this would change their appearance and characteristics.

Sometimes, evolution would include awakening, or strengthening of a bloodline This would often happen to Chimeras. The strongest, and rarest known advancement, was a Chimera who had almost fully awakened a Pure-Dragon bloodline. This allowed that Chimera to utilise elemental spells that a physical beast-type species would never normally be able to possess that early on.

"How would you like to die, Noble?" The last part of the question was full of mocking, something even the arrogant son of nobility picked up.

"I wish to stay alive." The young man did not want to shame himself on picking his death, death is for commoners he thought. Furthermore, he just reached level 30, if he were to die, then no matter what artifact he held, he would lose his specialisation and return to level 29.

There was a massive difference between the second specialisation and the first. Many of his enemies would challenge him as soon as this happened, bringing even more shame upon his name.

"You ask for mercy? Mercy is for commoners." Kraton snarled as spittle sprayed the young man's face. The last thing the fourth son saw before he died, was Kraton's massive, hairy hand covering his face, crushing like a nut with ease.

Barren - the crystal Golem - shielded his hollow eyes as a white light encompassed both Kraton and Lysine. During the seven months, Lysine had caught up to Kraton in terms of level, and the two of them figured out the ratio of experience to let them level up at the same rate.

Normally this was 1:1, 50% to each Boss, however Lysine had something special to her, Kraton guessed that it was an Innate Talent, but it would have to be a very complex one.

It took around ten minutes for the Awakening to end. Kraton was the first to finish it and when he came out, his figure looked less moonsterous than before. Although he was still a giant, and was hairier than humans, his physique had improved drastically.

If Kraton were to invest all his attribute points from three or four levels into his looks, he would pass of as a very handsome monster, like a Dijinn, but less etheral.

Kraton also seemed to gain a natural armour around his body. It almost his chest had a region of hardened hair, skin and had a bit of a scaly feel. It reminded Barren of a monster in an archaic game called Pokemon; a fiery, humanoid cat.

Kraton examined himself and flexed his muscles, he felt power surging through his body, every movement felt refined and clean, like his veins and mana channels had opened up.

Soon, the light around Lysine disappeared as well. Lysine breathed in awe as she looked at herself.

Her scales were much more vibrant, and even the human skin part of her felt stronger, sturdier.

The two wings that grew on her back resembled more like the powerful wings of a Dragon now, though the scales on it signified it as a Lamia's wing.

The snake-like tail had also grown, its tadpole tip now had a greenish shade on the end. After a bit of movement, Lysine found that she now had venomous glands. Strong, paralysing venom could be excreted out of her sharp tail, fangs in her mouth as well as from the three scales on the back of her hand.

The venom was extremely useful as she would also be able to coat her daggers with it.

Like Kraton, her Physique also increased; her scales seemed stronger, harder and more flexible, whilst her muscles were more powerful. Her speed almost rivaled that of Kim's now.

Barren watched the two, his crystaline body tinted orange in excitement and happiness for the two, and his eyes seemed to look over them with nostalgia. Maybe he too would experience another advancement in the future.

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