Jason crouched down and picked up a monocle with its frame designed like a wolf’s head. A rather odd item to see as the only time he saw this kind of thing was in a British film.

“Scan,” he said.

Lupin’s Silver Monocle.

Category : Eyewear

Grade : Unique

A gentleman’s famous eyewear, only nobles of the lost forgotten Wolfstein Kingdom favored this kind of fashion. But a rather infamous enchanter imbued a certain energy within this monocle giving birth to a gent’s combat prowess to supplement his deteriorating eyesight.

Effects : Raise accuracy of ranged damage by 30%, 6x time scope enhancement, increase shooting range by half a mile

Jackpot.

Jason was exhilarated having such an item in his hand. Even the grade was dubbed as unique, the archer kobold really dropped some good loot. This was the third and the last he found among those that he had killed, the last two weren’t that bad but it paled in comparison to this old fashion monocle.

Jason didn’t wait around as he immediately wore it over his right eye and the effect was amazing as if he could really looking through a sniper optic scope. For once he felt very lucky.

Did I already use all my luck in this whole lifetime?

Even himself had a hard time believing this was the truth, albeit that smiling face of his betrayed the low expectation of his own luck.

I think it’s only been a couple of minutes. I wonder how they’re doing. I did kill most of them but did I miss a few or was there a lot more?

While he was having fun picking up loots, his pondering was rather untimely considering his teammates were not having a good time right now.

Meanwhile, on top of the tallest building in the area, three people were confronting a single lone kobold. The kobold was a scout type known to be an agiler type than their otherkin. The kobold didn’t bother taking out its two jambiya-like daggers as it rushed at the mumbling Scott. It recognized the immediate threat as it bared its five sharp claws a single leap of this humanoid monster was enough to close the gap between them.

Scott knew he started too late, one of the things he hated about his skill was the long casting time, a minute was his fastest casting time as long as he was in full concentration. But he stopped as he saw the incoming claws.

Again, he was too late. He was at level nine and poured most of his points to energy and agility. His intention was becoming a speedy ganker with his lone area of effect skill but all those points to agility had gone to waste as he froze in front of the incoming attack. Knowing that these furry humanoids are many leagues above his own, it instilled a defeatist mentality inside of him.

I don’t want to die, thought Scott.

Then his wish was granted. A tall man with his height coming close to the kobold creature stood in front of Scott. Hakeem defended Scott, he stood there like a knight using his own body as a shield but it came with consequences. In mere seconds, his Iron Body points were cut by half. Hakeem felt his action was stupid but backing down wasn’t an option, he swung the iron mace in his hand smashing it right at the kobold’s head.

He was expecting the kobold to topple down but the kobold barely flinched. Hakeem saw the glint in its eyes as if telling him that he was merely ant in front of it.

Hakeem didn’t stop smashing his iron mace at the kobold as those continuous blows only made its head moved a bit. Then Esther came into the picture as she struck from behind. She leaped in the air jumping at the kobold, she slashed both her daggers at the neck of the kobold. But seconds before the blade could reach its neck, something powerful just slammed her right across the body. She was thrown into the air as she dropped rolling on the floor. Her energy guard dropped to zero breaking into nothingness. She was vulnerable to death itself.

“Esther!” said Hakeem.

Hakeem stared back at the sight of the kobold as he swung his mace at the creature. Again, his hit did nothing. He was about to give up seeing how ridiculous it was to fight against a creature that was doubled his level.

“Stall for time,” Scott called out to Hakeem as both of his hands directed at scout kobold. His lips started mumbling those incomprehensible words as the energy within him started to arouse the power within him.

Hakeem knew this guy was trying to do something and with no Jason around, Scott was his best bet.

“Iron Body!” Hakeem shouted as his whole body started to turn into a metallic shine. His defensive ability had also another useful internal ability, a buff type of ability. The moment he activated it, his whole body would turn and looked like a piece of iron, pumping up his overall defensive capability as well as his strength by 25% but not without a cost.

“I can only give you three minutes top,” said Hakeem. But within that slight second of him glancing his head back, a punch came smashing at his head throwing him off the floor as he flew before slamming across the wall of the staircase.

Shit, he didn’t even last a second, thought Scott as he braced himself over what was about to come.

“Yargh!” but to his surprise, Hakeem was alive and well as he ran towards the scout kobold. This time he did what Jack did to the beanstalk, he swung the heavy iron mace and slammed over the side of the scout kobold’s knee.

The kobold buckled down on one knee and its face loathed the fact that he was down because of this under level human in front of it. His claws slashed over Hakeem's chest as sparks flew. One of the perks of activating his Iron Body was quadrupling his Iron Body points. He withstood the ferocious claws marks and once more, he swung at the knee.

But the agile kobold dodged it and slammed a knee kick right on Hakeem’s chin. He felt his whole brain trembling but with Iron Body in play he was still in the game. He kept on coming swinging the mace at the kobold bidding his hope to the man who was still mumbling.

One minute didn’t even pass but he felt like it was an hour. His swings kept on missing and his body kept on being poured by this constant claw marks as the tactical vest and black tactical outfit he wore was being ripped into shreds. But Hakeem didn’t back down and with his constant yell, he took the offense to the creature.

Then he saw a furry fist coming straight to his head. It was fast but at the last second, he unleashed Euro Step as he side-step the punch. With the kobold still playing around with Hakeem, the man saw a chance.

He remembered what Jason mentioned when going against a tougher opponent, it was either poking their eyes or choking the hell out of them.

Hakeem maneuvered towards the back of the kobold as he immediately did a chokehold. It was one of those things Jason taught him to do and after much grueling experience of going up against a beast like Jason, he managed to pull it off to this scout kobold.

He pulled it tight as the scout kobold turned flustered. The scout kobold clawed its way trying to remove the entity latching behind it, but a minute just passed.

“Get away!” Scott shouted.

Hakeem glanced at Scott saw those sharp spiky icicles directed at both him and the scout kobold. The numbers reached up to twelve and now he knew what Scott meant.

The scout kobold was alarmed seeing those icicles pointed at it. It tried to run away but Hakeem pulled his hardest as the furry humanoid started choking. Even for a strong creature when they were cut off from oxygen anything could happen. The scout kobold who was gloating its superiority at these humans started going down on its two knees.

“Fucking get away, damn it!” Scott gave the last warning at Hakeem.

But Hakeem didn’t budge as he still hung on to the scout kobold’s back. He knew that when he let this beast go, those icicles won’t be able to hit it.

“Do it!” Hakeem said.

Scott gritted his teeth and hurled those sharp icicles at the scout kobold. In the face of danger and for his own life, another man’s life didn’t matter that much to him.

Those icicles rained down over the kobold as it pierced through its thick furry hide. The kobold couldn’t even let out a howl as its neck was still being choke by a blasted black man.

Every part of the scout kobold was pierced with blood dripping from its wound, then its head drooped down. Hakeem noticed the weakened neck of the scout kobold. Thinking it was over, he let go of his hold and drew out a breath of relief.

Thankfully, he wasn’t hurt by the onslaught of those icicles. It seemed it wasn’t sharp enough to penetrate through the entire body.

Even Scott dropped on the floor as the intense situation within those few minutes was enough to make him bathing in his own sweat. But then his eyes bulged out as something was not right.

The kneeling immobile body of that scout kobold started to move. It feinted its own death and these two guys accepted without even confirming their kills. A rookie mistake.

“He isn’t dead yet!” Scott bellowed as he panicked.

Hakeem who was already relaxing his entire body wasn’t quick enough to get up from laying on the roof floor. The kobold was about to rush at Scott seeing he was the most vulnerable but then a silhouette emerged from the side of the scout kobold, two sharp daggers went straight into the scout kobold’s eye. It was Esther and she wasn’t dead yet.

The slit-eye of hers was shining with vigor as she resisted from cowering in fear and went straight into the action. She took her time fighting herself but she made it and just at the right time.

The scout kobold was caught off-guard by the appearance of this woman who it thought was dead but it was wrong. An atrocious pain sprang up from its right eye. Esther didn’t stop as he pushed the hilt of her daggers from behind forcing it right into its brain. She too learned this from her brother, go for the eyes and stab deep as you can.

The scout kobold retaliated as it swung its arm around like a wild beast being cornered. It wasn’t going to let itself die from these weak humans. One of its random swings hit Esther and it was enough to throw her off her feet and once more flung at a distance. This time, intense pain wracked her entire body as there was no energy guard to buffer the massive damage. She fell on the floor and rolled a bit before stopping, she folded her body like a shrimp as she yelled in pain.

“Esther!” Hakeem worried about Esther’s condition.

“It’s not dead yet!” but Scott’s voice brought him back to the main problem, the scout kobold.

Riddled with icicles all over its body, and two daggers stabbed deep into its right eye socket but it was still living and breathing. One word popped up inside both of Hakeem and Scott, this scout kobold was an absolute monster.

But with their life on the balance, Hakeem and Scott rushed at the kobold out of instinct. Hakeem came from the back and Scott from the front. Hakeem once again held it back using what time left that he had before his buff was over. The scout kobold struggled while shaking its head side to side and shaking his arms and legs trying to get away from this mad lad chokehold.

Yet Scott came to end this once and for all, he leaped and using the momentum that he had he pushed the hilt of the daggers with his entire weight.

“Die!” Scott and Hakeem shouted in unison.

Seconds later, it finally went limped. Hakeem didn’t felt any resistance from the furry beast. He didn’t let the beast go out of precaution but then a blue window popped up in front of him. It told him three minutes were finished and Iron Body was deactivated for one hour. Then intense muscles sores came assaulting his entire body, Hakeem flinched and dropped his bum on the floor.

But then another blue window popped up and this time it was good news. Hakeem leveled up fifteen and so did Scott. The Awakened from the special ops team finally reached level ten similar to the rank one in special ops division.

“One step closer,” said Scott.

“Oh, shit. Esther!” Hakeem who was happy for a while just remembered about Esther. But before he could glance towards Esther’s direction, something caught his eye.

“Awooooo…”

The howl of a kobold and it wasn’t only one. Scott who was relief felt goosebumps all over again. He immediately turned towards the roof staircase and saw more kobolds came out, one by one until the number reached up to five kobolds. Some of them even look stronger than the one they just killed. Bulkier and more muscular.

At that moment, both Hakeem and Scott had the same thought, they were both gonna die and there was no chance in getting through this.

But then a clap resonated in the air attracting the attention of all who were on the rooftop. They didn’t know where the sound came from but they definitely heard his voice.

“Good fight, but for now I’ll take it from here.”