Sniping

In the second battle, Sigma paid a bit more attention to Ed, and thanks to that, he got some things out of it.

[The skill Rage was added to the skill shop.]

[The skill Brute Strength was added to the skill shop.]

Sigma kept looking at him for a while, but Ed didn't show any other skill… so he assumed that those were passive ones or they just consumed stamina over time while enhancing his strength and speed.

"What? Did I do something?" Ed asked.

"Your fighting style is rather simple. I was just thinking about that," Sigma replied and then shrugged.

"Well, I am not skilled, and I am only good at taking hits and using raw power against the enemies," Ed replied, and then he began to work on the bodies to gather magic stones. "It works most of the time against monsters."

"What about demons?" Sigma asked.

"The order that everyone has is to run on sight of demons, and they aren't something that we can defeat with a small group," Ed explained.

From what Sigma had heard, they weren't exactly in small numbers since they lived in a society, so the chances of meeting them were pretty high. Despite that, they were willing to travel for months while risking meeting demons… they were either insane, or they knew that the message that they had to pass was absolutely necessary.

The group resumed their journey, and after half an hour, they met another group of Hyenas. While they were getting used to the fighting, that time, the enemies focused on Ed, and he ended up getting bitten. Eclair healed him several times to make the wound close faster, but they still had to wait for a while.

Ed - Lv 55

HP: 800/800

MP: 150/150

SP: 350/350

Strength: 80

Speed: 35

Magic: 05

Endurance: 80

Dexterity: 35

Resistance: 25

Status Points: 00

Skills: Rage Lv 38, Brute Strength Lv 33

Spells:

Passive: Cooking Lv 41, Swordsmanship Lv 42, Spearmanship Lv 14, Horsemanship Lv 32,

Skill Points: 00

Sigma suddenly had the idea of using Appraisal on Ed and confirming his strength. He was quite tough, but while his health was full, the wound in his arm still had deep teeth marks from the monster that bit him. Even with that much endurance… that made Sigma even warier of the power of the double-headed hyenas.

"Putting that aside… what the hell… Cooking Lv 41…" Sigma frowned. "It is even higher level than his combat skills."

Considering that Appraisal was at a pretty low level, Sigma could see a lot of information, so he wondered if the level only influenced agaisnt targets that could fight agaisnt that kind of ability. Knowledge is power, after all, and having knowledge about enemies was even more important.

In any case, it hurt Sigma's pride to know that he was ten times weaker when it came to taking damage to Ed… even though he would instead not take damage at all.

"We should move a bit slower now and let Eclair recover her mana," Sabrina said while looking around. "We are entering the enemies' territory, and soon we will have to face two groups of enemies. It will be better if we stay at our peak at all times."

"You have a point," Ed said while helping Eclair climb the horse.

Sigma felt that it was a bit too soon to be in a hurry, but he truly wanted to sigh. Unfortunately, he was the weakest of the group, even though he was resourceful and had a good head for combat. If the others needed to rest, it was also a matter of time until he had to rest as well. So, he might as well pace himself to make things more efficient later on.

"I have enough strength to use the longbow fully, but I guess I need more speed to deal with the enemies faster… that will make the others tire less than usual, and I will get more experience as well," Sigma thought while deciding where he should put his next status points. "Speed off you go… still, once night comes, and I guess I should use some mana to level up the spear and the knives that I have and see their parameters."

"Are you fine with that, Sigma?" Sabrina asked.

"No problem," Sigma replied and offered Sabrina a hand for her to climb the horse, and then he wondered if he also could make others level up.

It should be possible since he could make weapons level up… but would he do it? Probably not, since it was a strength that wouldn't help him directly, not to mention her level was probably higher, so a lot more mana would be needed for that.

It didn't take long for the group to see some creatures flying in the distance finally, and they could tell that they were the Verdiris even from kilometers away… at least they won't be surprised when they came to fight. Now that Sigma thought about it, birds in the middle of the day weren't exactly experts when it came to stealth attacks.

When Sigma looked to the sides, he noticed that some Hyenas were way too far from the path that they were using on both sides. They couldn't hide well since they didn't notice their arrival, but they will once they began to fight the flying monsters.

"It seems that we are about to enter an area that the flying monsters dominate… at least in a line," Sigma said. "Shouldn't we move to the sides and make sure that the enemies won't attack us from behind?"

"You have a point… also, the number of monsters is a lot higher than the last time we came here, so it will be better if we control them," Ed nodded.

"Since that is the case, let's try the strategy a bit now that we have the upper hand," Sigma declared. "You guys will expose yourselves near one of the rocks, and I will snipe the beasts at the top of one of them."