The Second Floor (3)

The cave was enormous, to the point where Nox could barely see the other end of it.

After Nox entered the cave, he walked down a long rocky hallway for a couple of minutes before finally emerging into the huge space.

Huge boulders, created by natural causes, were scattered around the cave.

No light reached inside the cave, making it impossible to perceive anything. But, Nox was able to see almost clearly, thanks to his 'Night Vision' skill.

'To think, such a large space existed under a cliff. How interesting,' thought Nox, as he spread his arcane throughout the cave.

A chill suddenly ran down Nox's spine, forcing him to take a step back.

A strange wall of darkness appeared at the cave's other end. It released a considerable amount of energy, making Nox rethink his decision to come here.

Nox stood still, examining the weird phenomenon.

'A similar wall of darkness had appeared in front of the boss room on the first floor, as well as in the dungeon on the zeroth floor,' he thought, 'just where are the monsters being summoned from?'

Before he could think of an answer, a bear stepped out of the darkness. Although it was similar to the bears Nox defeated earlier, it was larger in size, at almost twelve feet tall. Brown fur covered its entire body, and its red eyes glowed in the darkness.

It wasn't alone. Almost a hundred more monsters similar to it followed it out of the wall of darkness that had appeared.

"I'll need you guys here," mumbled Nox, readying the moon dagger and the wolf's claw. Heeding his call, shadow slaves emerged from his shadow, taking their places behind it.

Together, the entire army of bears rushed towards Nox. Unlike the knight army on the first floor, they didn't attack in groups but all together.

The shadow knight and the shadow assassin readied their weapons as they sprinted towards the bear army, followed by a shadow bear each. The shadow magician stayed behind Nox and started to chant a spell.

[For the next twenty minutes, all the stats of all allies have increased by ten!]

[For the next twenty minutes, all your stats will increase by ten!]

"You are even able to do something like this. Nice work!" Nox said, showing his shadow magician a thumbs up. The shadow magician bowed heartily, blushing.

Some of the charging bears lunged at Nox's shadow slaves, slashing their huge claws at them.

The assassin easily evaded the attack and thrust his dagger into the chin of the bear. Another bear got behind the shadow assassin and tried to strike the assassin with its massive paw. Before the shadow assassin could react, it was tackled by the shadow bear.

While the shadow assassin used agility and swift movements to take care of the enemies, the shadow knight depended on its bear strength.

With its sword, the shadow knight sliced every monster that came to attack it. Suddenly, a group of ten bears got on top of the shadow knight, not giving it enough space to swing around its sword. The shadow bear, following the knight, tried to tackle the bears but was soon pushed away.

"Uuuuuwwwaaaaaahhhhh!!!" roared the shadow knight from underneath the bears. Even with its increased stats, it was unable to escape from the ten bears' grasp.

Suddenly, the throats of the bears started getting sliced one by one.

'I may as well take care of as many bears as possible while, 'shadow morph' is still active,' Nox thought, slashing another bear's neck.

Like a missile, he darted through the bears, slicing them.

[Shadow Morph has ended]

Within 'Shadow Morph's' duration, one minute, Nox had taken down twenty-six bears. His shadow slaves had also taken down around twenty bears.

As soon as Nox's stealth skill ended, a bear charged him. He easily dodged the bear's charge, and using his arcane-coated fist, he punched the bear's snout, knocking it to the ground.

The other bears, charging at Nox, stopped in their tracks. Slowly, they began to move backwards.

'I guess even monsters like these can feel fear.'

It was obvious that the bears had started to fear Nox. It had only been around fifteen minutes since he entered the dungeon, but he had already managed to slay half of the bear army.

ROOAARRR!!!

A loud roar could be heard throughout the entire cave. The bears stopped moving backwards, somehow regaining their confidence.

Another beast stepped out through the wall of darkness from where the monsters had emerged.

The beast was huge, at around twenty feet tall. Its body was covered in red coloured fur while the mane running across its backbone was white in colour. The other arkoudas looked like little infants in front of the giant beast.

[Mutated Giant Arkouda]

The bears parted, making a path to walk on between them.

"Heh. He wants to challenge me to a one on one, how interesting," mumbled Nox, strolling towards the mutated arkouda.

"Make sure that the normal bears don't interfere," he commanded his shadow slaves before coating his dagger in arcane.

The mutated giant arkouda firmly stood in a place, waiting for Nox to make the first move. Its eyes were fixed on Nox, slowly moving towards it.

'Dash.'

Within an instant, Nox appeared below the monster's chest. Using his dagger, he tried to slice the monster's legs. After all, the best way to fight a giant monster was to attack its limbs first and bring it to the ground.

"What!" exclaimed Nox, jumping back. Even though he had coated his dagger in arcane and used all his strength, he could only inflict a small scratch.

'Its skin is tough!'

The beast roared again.

ROOARR!!

[The mutated giant arkouda has used the skill: Flame armour]

The next instant, the entire body of the giant bear, was covered in flames, forcing Nox to move away from it.

'Tch. Even though I have fire resistance, those flames managed to burn me.'

His clothes were partially burned, and several burn marks were visible throughout his body.

Taking advantage of this chance, the average bears tried to get near Nox and attack him, but they were killed before they could reach him by his shadow slaves.

The mutated arkouda growled, moving towards Nox. Every step it took shook the entire cave.

'Weakness sight!'

Nox activated his skill, trying to find some sort of weakness. But, all he could see were the typical weaknesses, like the eyes and the neck.

'I guess there's no shortcut to take it out.'

Nox stiffened the muscles of his right hand, holding the moon dagger. With all his might, he threw the dagger, aiming at the eye of the huge monster.

Whoosh!

The dagger flew, piercing the air itself.

The flame armour completely stopped the dagger's momentum, making it fall to the ground before it could even touch the monster's skin.

Nox called back his dagger. It seemed that throwing projectiles wouldn't work on this beast.

'I'm sorry moon, but I need a bigger weapon right now,' apologised Nox, putting the moon dagger along with its scabbard in his inventory.

From the inventory, he took out the weapon he had obtained on the first floor. The Blood Cursed Axe.

Even though the axe was the same size as Nox, he was able to easily swing it around with just one hand.

Resting the weapon on his shoulder, Nox strolled toward the giant monster.