Chapter 53 - Clearing the Swamp

Point Blank didn’t just stand around watching. She started helping kill the crocodiles, just as Arthur had asked. Her damage was much lower, but still considerable.

"This bow is so good," she said while firing arrows at a crocodile.

That crocodile started walking toward her. Arthur put away his bow and drew his sword. Point Blank still couldn’t get used to it. The guy could fight both at range and up close.

Running in with his sword in hand, cold energy swirling around it, Arthur landed a simple attack on the crocodile. A basic attack that didn’t deal much damage.

His movements were fast. The sword had a +10% atk speed effect, and the leather gloves he’d crafted also had a +5% attack speed increase, which meant he could pull off several attacks in a short amount of time.

"Take that!" he shouted.

The sword struck the crocodile’s front leg.

[87 Damage Dealt]

It was good damage considering he hadn’t used any skills. The attack tore through the crocodile’s tough hide, making it bleed, and instantly switching its aggro to Arthur.

That was exactly why he used a normal attack. He just wanted to pull the aggro to himself.

The moment the crocodile switched aggro and lunged for a bite, Arthur activated his Swordsman class skill.

[Sword Guard - Active Skill (Lv. 1)]

[Description: Raise your sword and enter a defensive stance, reducing damage taken from incoming attacks.]

[Effect: Reduces damage taken from frontal attacks by 50% for 4 seconds. Each successful block increases the damage of your next sword attack by 30% + 20% Agility. This effect can trigger up to 3 times.]

[MP Cost: 15 MP]

[Cooldown: 28s]

The moment he activated it, Arthur shifted into a specific stance, holding the sword in front of him like a shield.

The crocodile bit down, and the attack was blocked. Part of the damage, at least.

[-80 HP (50% Blocked)]

It was considerable damage. If he hadn’t been guarding, he would’ve taken double that. Arthur had around 900 HP when adding the 10 vitality bonus from his armor set and the 5% HP increase from the Soul Augment on his chest piece.

Not to mention all the defense points the armor gave him. And even then, the damage was high.

The reason was simple: the crocodile was 5 levels ahead. Killing monsters above your level gave an experience bonus, but at the same time the player took more damage because of the level difference. This was more noticeable at the start of the game. Later on, with items giving tons of defense and attributes, that increase became less significant.

"Watch out!" Point Blank shouted the moment she saw the crocodile bite him.

She knew he wasn’t a tank class and would take a lot of damage. But she never imagined it would be 80.

"Only 80? I thought you were gonna lose almost half your health... And how the hell do you have so much HP? That’s practically the same as Tower’s!"

The crocodile attacked again quickly, this time spinning its body and swinging its tail at Arthur. He blocked it again, taking 80 points of damage.

After landing those two strikes, the crocodile would have a delay before attacking again. Every monster had a certain pattern, after all. Nobody had the stamina to attack forever, not even monsters.

That was when Arthur activated another skill.

[Phantom Slash - Active Skill (Lv. 1)]

[Description: Unleash a series of fast slashes, attacking the target multiple times in a short period of time.]

[Effect: Deals 70% Weapon Damage + 35% Agility + 7% Strength as Physical Damage per hit. Strikes 4 times.]

[MP Cost: 20 MP]

[Cooldown: 24s]

[Total Damage: 280% Weapon Damage + 140% Agility + 28% Strength]

Arthur started attacking the crocodile nonstop, cutting it in several parts of its body. The attacks were so fast that small bluish threads of lightning seemed to form with each strike.

[135]

[141]

[153]

[159]

Each attack dealt a different amount of damage because it hit a specific part of the crocodile’s body. Not every part had the same defense. Not to mention the accumulated damage was destroying its scales, increasing the damage of each attack even further.

On top of the skill’s own scaling, Arthur had a 30% boost to total damage, plus 20% of his agility. By the end of the 4 rapid strikes, the accumulated damage was 588!

Combined with the damage Point Blank had caused and his basic attack from before, the crocodile dropped dead on the ground.

[+280 EXP]

[+1 Silver Coin]

Everything happened very fast. Those 4 slashes from Phantom Slash took only 1 second. Point Blank had already nocked a new arrow, ready to attack and help him, but it wasn’t necessary.

They moved out of the swamp and closer to the dry part of the forest, using a tree as shelter since it was still raining. Arthur started collecting stones and sticks to build a fire. Both of their stomachs were already growling.

"Dude, are you using cheats? What the fuck is that damage?" Point Blank asked, dead serious.

That first hit with Sniping Shot had already been bizarre, but Phantom Slash was just as absurd. Not to mention the skill didn’t have a super long cooldown, meaning it could be used fairly often.

"Of course I’m not using cheats," Arthur replied, rolling his eyes. "I’m just too good, you know? You think my fame fell from the sky?"

"Aren’t you getting a bit full of yourself?" Point Blank teased. "Anyway, we’re leveling up really fast. You’re already close to level 11, and I’m close to 12, and we still have a ton of monsters to kill. Fucking great."

Arthur started rubbing a stick to get the fire going. Luckily, the game system itself gave a helping hand, otherwise he’d be stuck there for a long time. The crackling fire warmed their bodies within seconds. The sound of the campfire burning was cozy, even more so with the raindrops falling.

They pulled pieces of meat from their inventories, put them on a skewer, and started cooking over the fire.

"Having to stop to eat, drink water, and recover stamina is a pain," Arthur complained.

Besides HP and MP, there were stamina, hunger, and thirst. While HP and MP were easy to recover with potions during combat, stamina was different. It was an attribute that didn’t even show directly on the panel. It increased over time, as the player became more physically active.

Any item that increased stamina was highly valued and sought after by players. Arthur wanted to see if he could craft one. It would help a lot during his leveling.

"Yeah, but at least it tastes so good," Point Blank said, mouth watering as she stared at the piece of meat over the fire. "It always tastes even better after sweating it out killing monsters."

"You’re damn right about that," Arthur said, biting into a large piece of meat. The juice ran down his chin, and he wiped it with the back of his hand. "We still have what, 20 crocodiles to kill?"

"I think so," she replied, chewing slowly. The meat was still hot, steam curling off it in the cold rain. "It’ll take us like, an hour maybe? Do you think we’ll get a lot of EXP when we turn in the quest?"

The EXP from monsters wasn’t the only EXP they would get. Finishing the quest would give them some too.

"For sure. This might take us really close to the leaderboard. We might even pass your friends."

Point Blank’s eyes lit up. She shoved the rest of the meat into her mouth, barely chewing before she swallowed, and was already half-standing when she remembered her stamina bar. Still red. Still recovering. Five more minutes.

She sat back down with a groan, fingers drumming against her knee, eyes fixed on the swamp like she wanted to will the crocodiles to come to her.

Arthur was sitting around waiting for his stamina bar to recover when he got another message. It was from the guild leader of the assassins who had tried to kill him. Again. He opened it to read.

"Can we talk somewhere private? I promise it’s a good offer, and I won’t waste your time."

Short and straight to the point, exactly the kind of message Arthur liked. Nothing pissed him off more than huge walls of text in his in-game inbox...

He didn’t share that with Point Blank. Better to keep it to himself.

Once their stamina bars recovered, the two went back to killing crocodiles, clearing out the rest of the swamp. At least for a while, until the monsters respawned...

By the end of the massacre, Arthur was very close to hitting level 12, while Point Blank had already reached it.

Only after they stopped fighting did Yuki come out of Arthur’s body and start splashing around in the puddles along the way.

"I still don’t know what kind of animal that is," Point Blank said, staring at Yuki. "So weird. I didn’t even know you could have pets."

"His name is Yuki. He’s supposed to help me in combat, but he’s a coward. Didn’t come help me a single time."

She laughed. "Leave him alone. Look how cute he is."

Yuki jumped into Point Blank’s arms and curled up there. Mentally, he said, "she’s way better than you. While she praises me, you judge me."

"Oh, cut that shit out," Arthur teased. "Keep it up and I won’t let you near water to swim in for a month."

"..."

As they walked through the forest, Arthur kept thinking about the crocodiles, still with a pang in his heart.

’I should’ve brought a knife to skin them... I need to carry more tools.’

Before they reached the elven settlement, Arthur stopped walking, leaving Point Blank puzzled by the sudden change.

Then, out loud, he said, "Imra sent you to follow us, didn’t she? You can come out. No need for all that. I’m not an enemy."