“The board was really underrepresenting what the Endless was like,” Arik, the Arik, who didn’t talk that much, was complaining about their situation as he sent a bear flying in the air.

“100% the majority never thought about doing what we are freaking doing,” Gar, who received the bear and killed it by using hundreds of energy threads, responded by insulting their straight-line plan.

“I love it!” Rune exclaimed from far away as he blocked a bear charge and started to box its face.

“I love it too!” Astryde was the same, or maybe she became crazy? With those monster waves that kept coming and coming she couldn’t punch them all.

After 3 weeks, they traveled deep into the tier 2 zone, and they had an inkling that it wasn’t a tier 1 zone on the other side.

The highest trees were all at least 80 meters high now, the so-called primitive forest from before was only a garden compared to what their environment looked like now.

And while it was still a forest, it wasn’t only a forest of trees, it was also a forest of monsters.

One week ago they felt that the number of monsters was increasing ridiculously, and now it would be an insult to tell that before that point they fought “waves” of monsters.

Hundreds of tier 2? Merely an appetizer amidst the blood-gorged forest.

Tier 3? At least one or two per battle, they traveled like they were true natives here like it wasn’t a tier 2 zone.

Tier 4? They were surprised that some didn’t appear yet.

“Two tier 3 approaching, a rhinoceros using earth and a horse using lightning!” Rune was the one who always told the bad news, and he was enjoying it, “A group of birds diving from the south! Wolf encirclement is starting 1 kilometer away, I count 600!”

Using a medium reinforcement, he grabbed the bear in front of him and flipped it upside down, stunning it by putting it down on its back then kicking its face.

Another horse passing by, he tackled it, pounced on it, and punched it 5 times in its head before signaling Nelo to kill it.

‘It’s intoxicating,’ Rune’s thoughts were clear, he used everything he knew to kill or lead the monsters to be incapacitated till Nelo could achieve it.

Numbers weren't the only thing that increased as they went deeper, every monster also left a higher value core on their death.

Now when they divided the loot at the end of every fight, they all received more than one hundred cores.

They were often interrupted during their digestion and sometimes another wave of 400 monsters came, and only after killing enough would they find peace for some hours, allowing them to absorb all their gains.

Every day they absorbed hundreds of cores, every day they had 16 hours of unending fighting, every day they progressed, every day since 1 week ago Arik complained about every fight, every day they saw more blood than the day before.

If every tier 2 had to battle like them, then the world would be filled with mad people, crazy enough to battle tier 3 without even having their slotted masteries reach tier 2.

‘This strength is intoxicating.’

More stats opened more possibilities for Rune, more evasion, punches that could break bones and incapacitate in one move, more health as shield, more energy in reinforcement.

He reached a point where he could feel free to deliver death around him, he fought those same monsters so much that he knew their every move.

Rune Tudor (Tier 2)

Class: Frontline Pathfinder

Specialty: Shelled Dimensional Perception

EP: 1 090 275

Stats Total: 16 064

Health: 2 000

Health Regeneration: 2 000

Strength: 2 000

Cohesion: 2 000

Energy: 2 000

Energy Regeneration: 2 000

Purity: 500

Affinity: 500

Momentum: 1 064

Perception: 2 000

519 734 880 EP in 3 weeks? Only an appetizer, because one thing was true about the Undecided, it was that the end justifies the means.

From the IGS point of view, the Undecided would be part of the “promising group of adventurers who had lots of ambition and dared to dream big”.

But only now did they truly start to live up to what they expected of themselves, a gathering of friends who wanted to pave their own path, a group of pioneers.

And every one of them put their foot on the start of this path.

Masteries

Tier 1 Masteries

Physical Fundamental: Reinforcement: Tier 2 Level 34

Physical Fundamental: Fighting Instinct: Tier 2 Level 31

Physical Fundamental: Body Control: Tier 2 Level 32

Energy Fundamental: Fine Manipulation: Tier 2 Level 18

Energy Fundamental: Grand Manipulation: Tier 2 Level 20

Energy Fundamental: Energy Compression: Tier 2 Level 38

Spiritual Fundamental: Perception Control: Tier 2 Level 20

Spiritual Fundamental: Awareness Division: Tier 2 Level 11

Spiritual Fundamental: Momentum Manipulation: Tier 2 Level 14

Tier 2 Masteries

Energy Compression: Basic Energy Armor: Tier 2 Level 5

Energy Compression: Basic Defensive Energy: Tier 2 Level 4

Reinforcement: Basic Reinforced Armor: Tier 2 Level 3

All his slotted masteries reached tier 2, giving them each a reality-bending power.

Energy Compression: Energy Armor

Basic Slotted Mastery (Tier 2)

The basic spell of the defensive compressed energy school, only by understanding it can you comprehend all the intricacies and the potential hidden by this spell.

You perfectly mastered this spell, but you can now push it further, the efficiency of your energy compression is increased by an additional 5% (1% per level).

Energy Compression: Defensive Energy

Basic Slotted Mastery (Tier 2)

Using compressed energy as an additional defense, you want to master the mysteries behind this while also pushing its potential beyond what others thought to be its end.

There’s no more secret in this particular use for you, but you can create your own secret, the efficiency of your energy compression is increased by an additional 4% (1% per level).

Reinforcement: Reinforced Armor

Basic Slotted Mastery (Tier 2)

Your armor is an extension of your body, it also amplifies your power if you know how to use it properly, you want to explore this potential and unearth all its possibilities.

With armor on, you learned how to perfectly adapt to it and explore a new way of battling, increasing the efficiency of your reinforcement by an additional 3% (1% per level).

If he only focused on defense, Rune could now generate 49 armor every second with his efficiency bonus of 47%, but in addition, he also regenerated 33 health every second.

And his fighting style excelled in using all his resources to their maximum potential, so except for when he had to block a tier 3, he never felt chained, impeded, or in mortal danger.

Nelo was also starting to become a monster annihilator.

He used every point of energy he got to kill one monster every minute as long as Rune blocked everything and let him do what everyone called an “ultra energy laser”, which killed every tier 2 in one shot.

The Rune and Nelo duo wasn’t even at the apex in terms of killing speed, Arik and Gar were the uncontested kings as the 2 could kill one monster every 30 seconds.

Utopia was truly at the speedster stage of his build, he was going so fast that no birds could pass by his cover, and they fell like rain as chaos reigned in mid-air and only some part of the birds’ bodies ever touched the ground.

It was clear for everyone here, including themselves, the Undecided were speedrunning their tier 2 with monsters as their boost.

They weren’t surrounded and trapped by hundreds of monsters, it was the monsters who were trapped here with 7 mad and crazy entities.

Before Rune could react, a horse covered in lightning sent him flying, seeing a tier 3, Nelo immediately started his bombardment because he knew that Rune wouldn’t take long before coming back.

The rhinoceros was charging at Astryde and Adreana but Arik and Gar were near them, it meant that Utopia was rushing to help Nelo and Rune, that was logic.

Before the first energy laser from Nelo touched the horse, Rune was back in place.

He had only been surprised by an immense burst of speed it used to “teleport” before him and hoof-struck him, he wouldn’t let it do that one more time.

He charged and provoked the horse with large high-pitched sounds emanating from a sound bomb then used the disturbance created by Nelo to evade another hoof strike, but the horse wasn’t joking and directly activated an electric aura.

Shocked by it, Rune had his movement interrupted again and again and couldn’t resist the next hoof in his stomach, bending him in two as he was projected and sent rolling on the ground as a result.

‘That’s tier 3 for you.’

It was still the same, his only role against a tier 3 was to be a punching bag while he waited for his friends to come to the rescue.

And this one was extra fast.

Rising to his feet and rushing back, the horse was already before him and once again kicked, the electric aura, the most basic application of an elemental specialization, was still inflicting damage every second and only let Rune with a regeneration of 30 health per second, and it was emptying very fast.

After 3 more strikes emptying more than 1 000 armor, Utopia finally reached the horse side and punched it with a major reinforcement followed by another major reinforced kick.

Rune was only waiting for this as he tackled the horse by the leg to let Nelo have a clear line of sight, and 3 seconds later an ultra energy laser disintegrated the horse's head.

Rune stood up and rushed towards Nelo to once again create a circle of protection around him.

Utopia took care of finishing the health pool of the incapacitated but still alive horse before returning to the sky to protect from bird’s diving, and the fight continued.

A lizard charged at Rune and he blocked it with one hand by dispersing the coming force into the ground, then punched it in the nose, stunning it for a bit, before changing target by colliding with a wolf and kicking it hard enough to send it colliding with another horse monster.

A mantis suddenly sprung up from all the monsters but he evaded and ripped its sharp limb that it wanted to use to pierce Rune’s head.

But from the overflowing monsters, a combined attack by 4 wolves finally forced Nelo to intervene by descending and fighting personally.

Rune couldn’t let Nelo fight too long because his massive stubbornness made it so that he only used health and didn’t use his energy to defend himself, he kept it all for his spells.

He was very dedicated to his art.

Tier 2 monsters couldn’t keep up with Rune, he exerted 132% of his strength, the equivalent to 2 640 strength stat, to propel himself and clear the monsters as fast as he could.

But even then, what was bound to happen happened, and it began with a disturbance in his sphere.

“Monster wave from the west! Bull-like monsters charging at bullet speed, no indication of a tier 3, thousands of monsters!” Rune reported.

“We’ll use it against them! Rune and Arik, wall formation, everyone else to air support!”

Utopia’s order resounded and Rune and Arik rushed towards each other while everyone else started flying, Utopia and Astryde in charge of the protection of the 3 spellcasters.

The earth and the trees were starting to shake, that was a true monster wave, something you couldn’t stop, only survive or flee from it, and the Undecided already survived it multiple times.

The speed a monster wave achieved was beyond what the monsters could support with their body and stat, so Rune and Arik would block them, causing those that charged towards them to be splattered by their own strength, emptying their whole health in a second.

The air support side would do as much damage as them because they would trip a maximum amount of monsters with flash, sound, and explosion spells.

The monsters would be trampled by their own congeners and in the end, the Undecided would swallow all the cores.

They were in the thick of the Endless, the true value of the Endless, a dimension which pushed you to your last entrenchments, put face to face with death, and Rune and Arik would punch death in the face.

The tremors were becoming so intense and the air support already started to fire spells, the trees were swaying like they were in the middle of a hurricane.

The collision was imminent, the two put all their momentum to increase their own weight, the only way they had to better prepare themselves.

And the collision happened, the bulls’ wave speed was beyond 150 meters per second, so the bulls seemed far away but they were not.

It was worse than feeling a tier 3 bird pecking a hole through your stomach, it was absolute strength, and the two were concerned and fascinated by this strength in a different way.

The bull that collided with them literally turned to dust the moment it collided with them, then another one, then another two, then their energy armor shattered and they were naked amidst rampaging and uncontrollable bulls, but they held on.

Immovable as they were, they stopped giving attention to anything else, this plan was intense, short but effective, very effective.

In 10 seconds, they caused the death of tens of bulls and perturbed the whole wave.

With the help from the air support, they bent the whole wave in the way only a very experienced group could because Rune and Arik were losing health every second.

But the wave could only collapse when a solid rock was in its way and it wasn’t powerful enough to break it.

The wave was bending, and now two sides were charging at each other without being able to stop.

“Jump!” Utopia gave the command, and two bloody beings jumped from the bull herd.

After jumping, this part of the wave continued its way, crashing into already colliding two sides, this plan was created from beginning to end by Adreana in a fever dream after they suffered near-death during their first true monster’s wave.

It used the mindless and unstoppable properties of a wave and turned it against itself beautifully, killing not only their own but all the monsters that they were fighting before the wave arrived.

2 minutes later, all the wave’s speed dissipated and the duos reformed to kill off any remaining monsters, which only accounted for a few dozens of bulls and some other monsters that miraculously survived.

After that, they started to gather the hundreds of cores, or maybe this time it was thousands of cores, they never had a battle this long and intense all along, but it was more than worth it for them.

‘With this, I’m one step closer to tier 3.’

Rune then checked his masteries level-up notifications.

*Ding* Physical Fundamental: Reinforcement reached Tier 2 Level 35

*Ding* Physical Fundamental: Fighting Instinct reached Tier 2 Level 32

*Ding* Physical Fundamental: Fighting Instinct reached Tier 2 Level 33

*Ding* Physical Fundamental: Body Control reached Tier 2 Level 33

*Ding* Physical Fundamental: Body Control reached Tier 2 Level 34

*Ding* Energy Fundamental: Fine Manipulation reached Tier 2 Level 19

*Ding* Energy Fundamental: Grand Manipulation reached Tier 2 Level 21

*Ding* Energy Fundamental: Energy Compression reached Tier 2 Level 39

*Ding* Energy Fundamental: Energy Compression reached Tier 2 Level 40

*Ding* Spiritual Fundamental: Momentum Manipulation reached Tier 2 Level 15

*Ding* Spiritual Fundamental: Momentum Manipulation reached Tier 2 Level 16

*Ding* Energy Compression: Basic Energy Armor reached Tier 2 Level 6

*Ding* Energy Compression: Basic Energy Defense reached Tier 2 Level 5

*Ding* Energy Compression: Basic Energy Defense reached Tier 2 Level 6

*Ding* Reinforcement: Basic Reinforced Armor reached Tier 2 Level 4

*Ding* Reinforcement: Basic Reinforced Armor reached Tier 2 Level 5

And then a sudden idea came to him.

“Oh yeah! How did I forget the explosion element! Of course, a firework needs its explosion to be felt! Heard that Utopia? How many slots do I need now?” He exclaimed.

A little irrelevant, but recently it was his past-time, finding potential firework amplifying masteries.

“Currently you have Fireworks element, Color element, Sound element, Light element, Shockwave element, and Explosion element, so 6 slots,” Utopia was a good friend and served as Rune’s memo, it was fun for him too.

“I say you need to add some catchy elements in it, lightning magic would be good!” Arik's serious look gave more weight to his argument, but Rune didn’t agree.

“Elements with actual effects will consume too much energy! No is no, if you want lightning fireworks then they will have the appearance but not the consistency.”

Rune was very serious. One day, maybe at tier 4, maybe at tier 6, he would take a long break to become a true fireworks magician.

Arik just turned his head as if ignoring what Rune just said, like what he said was the only proper answer, but Rune didn’t react and started to absorb the monster cores.

Everyone had more than 200 cores to absorb, but this time, probably, the zone in a circle of 20 kilometers around the battleground was empty as they weren’t interrupted by anything.

Rune gained 10 725 600 EP, which he invested in his momentum stat to increase it by 54, a 2-time ratio was really violent.

Rune Tudor (Tier 2)

Class: Frontline Pathfinder

Specialty: Shelled Dimensional Perception

EP: 1 015 875

Stats Total: 16 118

Health: 2 000

Health Regeneration: 2 000

Strength: 2 000

Cohesion: 2 000

Energy: 2 000

Energy Regeneration: 2 000

Purity: 500

Affinity: 500

Momentum: 1 118

Perception: 2 000

When he finished absorbing his cores, the others similarly finished and invested in their favorite low priority stat, influencing their ability by little, as they were low priority for a reason.

Rune just returned to where they were supposed to keep making a path, not even Utopia knew how deep they were in currently, too many battles had clouded his perception of distance.

If he asked when they were about to fight again, everyone would answer “In the next 30 minutes”, and that was true.

Not even one of their true objectives had been accomplished yet, no tier 3 zone, no region transition, no different topography, and no massive environmental change.

If there wasn’t a path behind them, then they would just be lost in an endless forest assaulted by monsters at every step, a true nightmare.

But now that 3 weeks passed, the days where sleep would be required would come faster and faster.

Not only Rune was training his spirit passively, everyone was doing it, as a result, cracks appeared and subsequently, repercussions in battle efficiency would become more and more visible.

Though it could also be just another challenge to overcome.