-Trust and Friendship-

The zombie guardian had given both Kenshin and Maria a real scare. Not only physically attacking was impossible due to its high agility and defense, but also magical attacks are useless since it can evade them.

If he doesn’t know any better, he would have thought that someone was behind this creature’s appearance.

“This…what will we do? This thing seems to perfectly counter us in all aspects” Maria shouted, clearly panicked by the monster’s abilities. She finally understood the horror of this monster.

“…” Kenshin had nothing to speak as he was busy keeping track of his HP as it was reducing at a very fast pace. Every few seconds he would seep a mouthful of the medium health potion to bring his HP back to safe zone. Although he was losing his HP like a broken faucet, the amount of EXP he gains for Passive Regeneration monumental. If this continues, then he would level up very soon.

[Passive Regeneration Lv 7][2154 EXP to next level up]

[Heals 4 HP and 1 STA every 4 seconds]

The zombie guardian didn’t move as it glared at Kenshin and Maria with its muddy eyes. Its mouth was open, but no saliva came out as it was already dead.

Despite looking panicked, Maria was many times experienced than Kenshin in dealing with strong and unusual monsters. Very soon she came up with other tactics.

“Kenshin, this thing is highly resistant to physical attacks. That shining shield on its hand seems to be quite unordinary. Let's attacks it with melee type magic attacks. I will stack it with my skill. You have to keep its attention away from me”

“Okay,” Kenshin nodded. He was quite convinced about Maria’s strategies. He believed in her experience.

Maria, although a magic type skill user, she had learned martial arts. Due to the nature of her skill, she had to, as it was a melee type skill. Both of them took a stance that makes them easier to run and zoomed towards the guardian.

While running, Kenshin schemed through all his skills in an attempt to find out the most optimal skill that could be used in this case. In the end, out of all his skills, he only had two offensive ones. Death Slash was an AoE type so leaving that aside, he can only use his fire skill. Currently, his fire skill could deal around 90 damage point if it was compressed. If used correctly, that attack can deal double the damage when a critical strike succeeds.

As such, Kenshin was a little optimistic; but still, it fell short in front of Maria’s magic damage.

The zombie guardian’s vision shifted towards Maria. It recognized the danger Maria possess towards it.

“Hyap!” with a strange shout, Kenshin thrust his sword towards the guardian’s head.

Ting!!!

It used the shining shield to block Kenshin’s sword. Not minding it much, he squatted on the spot and supporting his body with his hands, he legs swiped the monster. Although it had higher stats than Kenshin; its intelligence was very low. Unable to block, it receives the blunt damage of Kenshin’s leg swipe. It loses its balance for a second.

Supporting his body with his hands, he made a head spin and kicked the monster. Holding its shield tightly, it blocked Kenshin’s head kick. But the force of his kick made it, even more, imbalance. Maria flashed like a nimble cat and repeatedly touched the zombie guardian a few times on its back before backing out.

Kenshin used his hands as a pivot to push himself towards the guardian’s shield; then using it as a springboard, he backflipped a few meters away from the monster, displaying his astounding acrobatics. Exhaling lightly, he landed on the ground like a weightless feather.

BOOM!!!

Maria had already detonated her exploding tags placed behind the zombie guardian.

“GRRR!!” The Zombie Guardian howled loudly and painfully as it received the brunt of the damage fully.

‘-600’

A huge red text showing the damage point it received, floated above the guardian’s head.

“Nice!” Kenshin shouted in excitement seeing the zombie receiving a huge amount of damage.

“Ain’t I amazing?” Maria self-praised herself shamelessly.

Kenshin didn’t mind her. He even gave her a thumbs-up in response. They had already gone through two life and death battles together, so all the bad feeling they had, was already vanished.

What left was a unique kind of camaraderie and friendship. An unspeakable trust towards each other. Maybe, it was because both were simple-minded and didn’t have any ulterior motives towards each other. But whatever may be the reason, they had still become trusted comrades; to whom they can leave their backs. Maybe, it was because of the naivety on their part, but that naivety had gained them a very good partner and trusted aide.

Unknowingly both were quite relaxed around each other, despite not knowing each other for more than a day.

Nodding towards each other, they again resumed the same strategy towards the guardian.

The Guardian’s high intelligence compared to other monsters enabled it to adapt Kenshin and Maria’s strategy. This time it was very careful and backed away from their joint attack. Suddenly its body started glowing green color as another zombie raised from the ground.

Clearly, the guardian had used its Summon Zombie skill to help it.

“So, it also has this skill! I should have guessed it” Maria lamented as her confidence diminished a little.

“Maria, leave the minion to me. You keep an eye on the guardian” Kenshin shouted while making a beeline towards the level 20 zombie minion. All its stats were half of the guardian without its excess DEF and ATK.

Kenshin, who had already suffered at the hands of the guardian, was ready to take his revenge on the minion.

Unaware of Kenshin’s thoughts, the minion roared towards the heavens and ran towards him. It already had its eyes set on him from the moment it came out of the ground. 25 AGI was nothing in front of Kenshin as he could easily see through it. He sheathed his sword; taking a step forward, he threw his hands towards the incoming zombie’s right arm which was outstretched.

Grabbing it in a vice-grip, he used his right toe as a pivot and spun like a top, throwing the zombie minion in the process to the ground. Using his heightened AGI, he grabbed the zombie’s left leg after it hit its head on the ground and yanked it back.

His near 40 points of strength easily pulled the zombie-like it weighted nothing. He clenched his right hand to a fist; flames started licking on his gloved fist before it blazed like a bonfire. He then gave a devastating punch to the zombie minion’s chin, burying it in the ground.

But he didn’t stop there; jumping up a few meters, he faced the ground then unsheathed his sword while pointing its tip towards the minion’s head. Flames appeared on the sword tip as it produced air rings around it while descending towards the minion’s head.

Before the minion could recover from its concussion, it was stabbed again by Kenshin’s sword which was coated in a compressed Flaming Slash.

‘-42’

‘-90’

‘-200’

Various damage values floated above the minion’s head before it fell down like a broken doll.