"Death Swing!"

The middle two arms of Viridescent, clenched their fist. Clouds of thick mist suddenly erupted from white magic circles on the ground.

Within seconds, my vision was completely covered. Alfred stayed close to my leg. I heard loud destructive noises and trees falling over.

The mist cleared slightly. I was still on the hill but Yukari and the B-rank monster was no where to be seen as a thick mist surrounded the entire hill.

Magic circles appeared from above. A nest of loud buzzing hornet-shooters came flying through the circles. Several stingers were fired at us.

The scarf around my neck formed a small roof above Alfred and I, absorbing all the stingers. Spikes protruded from the scarf, killing a few of the flying bugs.

From behind, four giant lizards with armour shaped scales emerged from magic portals. At the same time, a large snake appeared from the front and launched itself at me.

I raised my shield to block the snake's fangs while part of the black scarf formed a fist that swung itself a the lizards. The snake's fangs managed to pierce my shield but luckily not far enough to hit my skin. I sliced the snake with a 'Sword Strike", drawing a bit its blood which the scarf drank almost immediately.

The scarf suddenly launched Alfred and I into the air. At the same time, green thick vines emerged from the ground and the mouth of a giant fly trap swallowed the ground that I was just standing on.

The hornets fired more stingers. I blocked some with my shield while the scarf took care of the rest, all while still in mid air. Parts of the scarf formed pitch black drills as I fell back to the ground. It pierced and killed the monster plant upon our landing.

My knight was ignored by all the monsters, probably because he was too weak to be considered a threat in their eyes. This gave Alfred the freedom to run from creature to creature and poke their lower parts to grab more droplets of blood for the shadow scarf.

Essentially, my role was boiled down to evading, blocking and getting more blood for my scarf so that it could do all the killing, more effectively.

More hornets, snakes and lizards appeared which kept the scarf busy. But then a red-eyed bear emerged from the ground right in front of me and swung its claw at me. I blocked with my shield but the impact was so great that it pushed me back several meters back, causing me to fall. The scarf tried to break my fall but it was still a rough landing. More stingers fired at me. Letting go of my heavy weapons, I rolled over to evade before quickly getting up. My body was already beginning to ache just from that one hit. That bear had a dangerous amount of strength.

These were all C-rank monsters attacking. It was going to take more than just the scarf to survive this.

...

-I-I-I-I-

...

From a great distance away from the hill, Yukari faced Viridescent.

It had blocked her 'Death Swing' with ease and was left completely untouched. The three arms on its left were occupied using spells on the people who were still at the hill. The other three arms prepared for the Reaper's next move.

The creature didn't summon a single monster against the Reaper and instead choose to fight her head-on. It almost ticked off the Reaper by how intelligent it was.

The creature raised its lower wooden arm. Three brown magic circles appeared in front of it. Instead of fire balls or arrows, the magic circles rapidly fired large tree logs in the Reaper's direction. Yukari sliced every single one that came flying her way.

She then cut herself again. Her cloak absorbed the blood before digging into the ground. A bottomless void of darkness began consuming the ground around the Reaper and went towards the creature.

The middle right arm clenched its fist. A sea of mist began consuming the ground around Viridescent and went to confront Yukari's sea of shadows. The mist and its glowing white lights swiftly overcame the shadows. The Reaper's cloak also weakened in response to the light.

"You magic users are so annoying."

A small snake popped out of the ground and sinked it's small fangs into her leg. She winced before swiftly killing it. She got more blood but now there was venom in her leg.

Viridescent then jumped an incredible height towards her with glowing mist surrounding it. Yukari went to face it with her scythe but a sudden pain in her leg caused her entire body to wince and freeze for a second. The B-rank monster pulled back its arms before delivering a powerful 'Triple Palm Strike' to the Reaper. Her shadow cloak wrapped around her like armour but the strike was still strong enough to shatter several of her bones as it sent her flying back.

...

-I-I-I-I-

...

It didn't take long for earth golems to appear. In fact, most incoming monsters were now just earth golems. Which was problematic since they didn't have any blood.

The red eyed bear was also a massive problem. It didn't bled. Whenever I sliced it, the cut would spill out no blood and would heal instantly.

At first the scarf was able to handle them, but as time dragged on, the scarf began shrinking and weakling in power. As soon as that happened, it didn't take for the battle to quickly go downhill.

A stinger shot me in the shoulder before one of the golem smashed me in the back. Even with the scarf lessening the blow, the pain was more than enough to make me scream. I fell over as the burning agony took over my back.

Alfred stood between me and the horde of golems. It was then, they noticed him. He was grabbed. He struggled but it made no difference. The rock golem then crushed Alfred in its hand before throwing him far away into the mist.

"A-Aflred!" I cried out.

Two more stingers shot me in the back.

A magic circle appeared below my feet. Before I could react, the head of a tree shot out from the ground and launched me high into the air. It then abruptly shot right back down, leaving me to fall back to the ground with a painful landing.

The bear pounced at me and crushed me further into the ground.

I soon felt the weight of earth boulders on top of me. I couldn't even scream as my head was deep in the ground. I couldn't breath.

The scarf had stopped attacking and was using what little blood it could get from my bleeding wounds to defend me and lessen the blows.

Was this it? The end of the road? To be honest, I'm quite impressed that I didn't die in the first few seconds. Before, a single C-rank monster could kill me in one hit. At least I could proud of how far I had gotten...right?... I wasn't hearing the sound of any new skills unlocking yet. If this isn't what you call the verge of death, then I don't know what is.

I wonder if the Reaper was able to escape... did she lose? I had no way of telling.

No...wait, that's right...the Reaper...it's not completely helpless...there must be a reason why it separated us...it most likely knows about Yukari's skills needing blood...if... I could just lure these monsters to her... there's still hope...I just had to...

During a time like this, I could only think of option, "Drink my blood."

The blanket of shadows that was shielding me made small sharp thorns and dug themselves into my arm and back. Somehow, it was able to extract blood without piercing physical holes in my skin. It still hurt like hell.

Multiple pitch black spikes protruded outward, piercing all the golems and the bear around me. The spikes moved to continue attacking, including the hornets in the air.

I stood up.

I managed to take a two step forward before completely crumbling to my knees. Each step felt bone shattering.

No...I couldn't let it end here. I have to get to the Reaper. I could hear the sound of their battle. They weren't far away. I needed to reach her...now...

The red eyed bear stood in front of me. I couldn't move and one more strike from the bear would kill me. There was nothing I could-

...

New Skill Unlocked:

Shield Dash (Active): Dashes the user forward. Speed and damage dealt by the dash will equal to 50% of you defence. CD: 1 min.

(Must be used with shield)

...

I summoned my stone shield.

"Shield Dash!" A silver ball of transparent energy wrapped around me as I was automatically launched forward like a cannon ball.

My legs did not move at all. It felt more like I was surfacing across the ground.

My shield bashed into the bear. Bringing the bear with me, I went past river and through the mist into the wide open grass area where the B-rank monster was. I stopped abruptly and the bear was pushed back a few meters away from me.

Without wasting a moment, I called out, "REAPER! I-"

I froze at the sight of Yukari's motionless body. Laying limp on the ground next to a ball of glowing mist, while Viridescent repeatedly crushed her using the bottom of a large tree log.

As I thought, this was a foolish decision. This death was well deserved. What were we thinking? What's the point of learning new skills if you're just going to die in the end?

I should've stopped her. I should've tried harder. This was my fault. I thought I had change. But no matter what, my foolishness and stupidity always comes back to bite me.

The bear stood back up and faced me. I could hear the horde of monsters coming after me from behind. Viridescent didn't even look my way and was focused on breaking Yukari's last line of defence.

This was it. Maybe it was for the best. A fake like me...probably deserved nothing more than this. I was better off dead.

Who knows...maybe I could finally find peace in death...right?

I stood there silently as the bear swung its claw at me.

That should've been it but then I blocked with my shield and stood my ground.

No.

...

New Skill Unlocked:

Shield Enhance (Active): Strengthens your shield for 10 seconds. CD: 45 seconds.

...

I can die later.

...

New Skill Unlocked:

Bladed Mitigation (Active): For the next 30 seconds, damage taken is reduced by 20% and damage is also reflected. CD: 10 minutes.

...

But right now, there's someone dying in front of me.

...

New Skill Unlocked:

Taunting Chain (Active): Fires a chain that forces the target to battle you. CD: 5 seconds.

...

I have to save them.

...

New Skill Unlocked:

"Regeneration" has upgraded to "Regeneration II".

"Endurance" has upgrades to "Endurance II".

...

"Return to your master." I whispered.

The shadow scarf immediately left me and dove into the ground but not before giving the red-eyed bear a huge punch in the face.

A long silver chain with cuffs at the end suddenly appeared in my hand. "Taunting Chain!" I threw it. The chain flew, extended and chased after my target: Viridescent.

The chain grabbed one of the creature's arms before disappearing. The B-rank monster turned its head and was now staring directly at me.

Six magic circles appeared. Tree logs were rapidly fired at me.

Putting my shield down, I yelled out, "Shield Enhance!"

My shield began shinning and it's stone material transformed into silver that shined brightly. It also grew five times it's original.

All the tree logs bashed into my shield but none succeeded in breaking it.

Viridescent then leaped at towards me and delivered a powerful 'Triple Palm Strike'. The impact was strong but I remained standing, barely.

Soon, the effects of "Shield Enhance" wore off. The B-rank creature summoned more monsters and more mist. Clenching all six of its fist, it began bashing me heavily while all the monsters attacked me from every side.

"Bladed Mitigation!"

The merciless onslaught continued. Each agonising point of a second felt like an hour. Many parts of my body were beginning to feel numb yet the intense feeling og pain that coursed throughout my whole body still lingered and multiple by each second.

Some golems cracked and crumbled.

Other lizard began dropping dead.

Viridescent's fist were bleeding dark green blood.

But they kept attacking and attacking.

My felt my vision slowly become blurry as I become sleepy and fell to the ground. I smiled... It was a fake smile that did poorly to hide my arms shaking in fear...at the very least... I could die with the hope that the scarf that I sent back went to save the Reaper and get her out of this forest.

...

-I-I-I-I-

...

She laid there on ground as a puddle of blood formed beneath her.

"Oi...Alfred...your beloved mother is dying you know?"

"..."

"Haha...she's making us look bad...ironic huh..."

"..."

"You're...seriously not planning on just laying here and letting her die...are you?"

"..." A bright silver light began engulfing the small knight.

She grinned, "That's what I thought."

The shadow scarf emerged from the ground and merged with Yukari's jacket.

The puddle of her blood began moving backwards as the shadow jacket absorbed all of it.

...

-I-I-I-I-

...

Viridescent turned to see a giant deadly scythe come swinging at its neck.

It threw all six of its arms in front of itself and jumped back. The blade of the scythe managed to just barely leave a deep cut across Viridescent's arms.

All of its attention was now directed towards something else.

A new large creature had appeared in front of the forest watcher. It was just as tall as Viridescent. It had no legs and ominously levitated off the ground. The new creature wore a huge torn up cloak. It was pitch black with dark red and purple particles floating around it. Inside the hood was a endless void of darkness. The only thing you could see in the hood were two blood coloured, glowing eyes and glowing, red sharp teeth. The shape of its face and mouth was similar to the faces that are usually carved on decorative pumpkins.

The new hooded creature had no other visible body parts besides two visible, white skeleton arms by its side. However, although the arms were positioned near by where arms are usually located, they looked as if they too were simply levitating and detached from the actual bodies. Holding over its shoulder was a giant shadowy scythe with a dark red blade.

"Bloody Reaper!"

The huge shadow creature swung its scythe again. Viridescent swiftly summoned a wall of four thick trees to block. He grabbed onto another tree like a blade and swung it. By the time that log was sliced, Viridescent would grab another one to swing with its other arm. They both continued in this manner. Logs of wood fell everywhere as the scythe swiftly swung and ripped apart multiple tree logs. At times, Viridescent even somehow deflected some of the attacks with just his palms.

Meanwhile, back on the ground where the horde of monsters were. A bright silver figure appeared before them.

The red eyed bear and the monsters all turned to look at the figure for a second...before they were all sliced in half in one swing.

I felt a pair of arms lift me up and carry me somewhere.

I opened my eyes again. Staring back at me was a knight's helmet which was made of cleaned silver. I saw no eyes through the two black lines in his helmet but I knew I was staring at him straight in the eye. He wore a shining, silver chest-plate. His entire body was covered in armour.

"Alfred..."

He gently laid me down and placed a hand on my head. A light green light coming from underneath his palm relieved my pain slightly. He then took out a huge, silver great-sword that almost rivalled his own height.

My knight faced the incoming hordes of enemies. He raised his large great sword. It began glowing brightly.

With another great shining swing, multiple golems, armoured lizards and snakes were sliced in half and killed instantly. Many flying hornets fired stingers at him but none of them pierced his armour.

The red-eyed bear came charging at him. Alfred thrusted his great sword forward and stabbed it straight through the middle of the bear's face. The bear showed no reaction and swiped its paw at Alfred's face. He took a step back but remained standing. He punched the bear's chin, sending it flying back.

All the other monsters back away. Instead, three more magic circles appeared and out came three more red-eyed bears.

He sliced one of the bear's arms off. The arm swiftly grew back and smashed Alfred's head. Another bear tackled him and pushed him across the grass, causing him to drop his weapon. He punched the bear in the head so hard that it went straight through the brain yet it kept going. The other bear bit his shoulder while the third one smashed his helmet with its

He was barely handling three. But then the first bear from earlier, also returned to attack again, fully healed.

They slowly overpowered him to the ground.

A chain grabbed onto the bear that was biting Alfred's shoulder. The bear's fangs released Alfred before it glared straight at me. It came charging towards me.

With a free arm and now able to stand up straight, Alfred single handedly grabbed one of the other bears and used it like a bat to hit the other two bears.

He then leaped up high, summoned his great-sword again and stabbed it straight through the charging bear as he landed, right before it could reach me. Even though the bear could heal, it was stuck since Alfred's sword had impaled its back all the way down to the ground.

Nine more red eyed bears came charging at us.

Once they were close enough, Alfred's sword began shining brightly once again. With the bear stilled impaled through his sword, Alfred lifted both his great sword and the bear before unleashing another great swing at all the nine bears, slicing all of them into two pieces.

The pieces of each bear all fell to the ground, making it look like it was raining bear parts for a moment. However, shortly after, all the bears began healing and regeneration until they all looked brand new. Alfred stood in front me in his battle stance, pointing his great sword as the horde of bears came charging at us.

Meanwhile Viridescent's and the Bloody Reaper's duel was still ongoing.

It summoned glowing mist to weaken her, but the blood shadows of the reaper's giant cloak were evenly matched with the mist.

The Bloody Reaper's cloak moved by itself and parts of it flew towards Viridescent with sharp spikes. Viridescent summoned a wall of tress to block, it then proceeded to grab those trees and swing them at the Bloody Reaper. The trees were swiftly taken care of.

Viridescent then clapped its six hands to together loudly. This caused an eruption of tress and thick mist that somehow pushed the Bloody Reaper back.

The bears that were charging at Alfred all abruptly stopped. To our confusion, they turned the other way and began heading towards Viridescent's directions. It wasn't just the bears. All the leftover hornets, snakes, lizards and golem were also all headed towards that same direction.

Alfred followed pursuit and caught up with the Reaper.

They both stared back at the hill in the middle of area. Viridescent was back standing on the hill. All the monsters were running or flying circles around him. There were always walls of mist and tress floating around it in the same circular manner. Mystic white, and green energy were gathering in all six of its arms.

Both Alfred and the Reaper could tell just from looking that the next attack was going to be a big one.

The Bloody Reaper grasped her giant scythe with both hands. All the purple and red particles began flowing into the scythe as it grew larger and lager.

Alfred positioned himself and raised his great-sword which began shinning brightly.

Viridescent grew two new arms that were covered in grass and bent its knees.

Once the scythe was at its largest form, the Bloody Reaper swung it as a deadly red bloody aura followed the swing. Hollowing Death Bringer!

Alfred mustered all the power he could into his weapon he could before delivering his strike. Great Divide!

With all the energy stored in its arms, Viridescent leaped towards Alfred and the Reaper with a powerful octuple palm strike. Forest Judgement!

At the same time, all three attacks clashed with each other. The clash of shadows, wood, iron and mist exploded, sending all these elements flying everywhere.

I had to look away thanks to the huge gust of winds blew everywhere, even the surrounding trees trembled at the clash. I looked again as the wind slowly calmed down.

By the end of the clash, the Reaper's scythe and Alfred's great-sword...shattered into pieces.

Its palms went straight through the weapons and delivered the final two blows to the knight and the Reaper.

Yukari reverted back to her human form as her limp body flew across the field.

Alfred's chest plate and helmet cracked massively as he was sent flying, all the way to the edge of the area where he smashed into trees.

They both laid motionless on the ground after landing.

I could only watch in despair as the only one left standing was the B-rank monster.

Viridescent vs Summoner & Reaper

Winner: Viridescent, Watcher of the Forest.

Sensing that Yukari was still barely alive, it raised its hand to finish her off with another skill.

But then a leaf flew past its eye. It wasn't the type of leaf that came from this forest. The colour of this leaf had a brighter green to it. It was a leaf that once again, brought great relief and hope with it.

More leaves appeared and flew around Viridescent's face. It tired to swipe them away but the leaves kept flying in front of its eyes. A gust of leaves flew around it.

Then, something or someone invisible lifted up the Reaper's body up and began sprinting across the field, right towards where I was laying.

"Your recklessness is beyond reasoning at this point," Judging from his voice, he was an Arthur fake. A man wearing a dark green cloak appeared right before my eyes.

"S-scout," Yukari could barely speak, "you're... s-suppose to be watching the village."

"My distractions are meaningless if you both die here." He replied as he laid the Reaper down next to me. He then sprinted away to get Alfred who luckily wasn't that far away.

More leaves appeared to distract Viridescent.

Yukari attempted to get up.

"R-reaper," I tried to reason with her as I already knew what she wanted to do, "we got what we came for. Now we must retreat."

"I...I can still...fight."

"Reaper please...it's all meaningless if we die here...Think about the village..."

"..." That seemed to work.

Scout came back, carrying Alfred over his shoulder. Now all we had to do was find the exit. The scout went to pick the Reaper up while Alfred limped over to me.

But then we all froze. We all felt a shiver run down our spines.

Viridescent was staring directly at us now. It had learned to ignore the leaves. Even if the leaves went directly into its eyes, its dark void-like eyes remained staring at us.

This worried the Scout greatly, "Oh no! I should've known it wouldn't work on it twice."

Eight magic circles appeared and out came a rapid barrage of tree logs that were all heading towards us. Yukari tried to summon her scythe but only ended up coughing blood out of her mouth.

Pressing against my limit and all the pain it took to just stand, I placed my shield down, refusing the urge to fall asleep, "Shield Enhance!"

Once again, my shield shined brightly, turned to silver and enlarged greatly so that it covered everyone from the logs.

An army of red eyed bears, earth golems and hornets began approaching us.

"Reaper, Alfred, grab onto me!"

They both complied.

"I'll follow. The exit is over there." The scout pointed at the other side of the horde of monsters before his cloak began disappearing.

Without wasting a second, I activated another skill, "Shield Dash!"

While my shield was still enlarged and enhanced, the three of us dashed forward automatically.

We dashed passed all the monster, passed the hill and right passed Viridescent who almost got us as we flew by.

I could see the opening in the trees. The same entrance we used to enter this area.

But then we stopped. Or more specifically, my skill ran out. The three of us fell to the ground right when we were at the foot of the exit. I could hear the horde of monsters coming after us

"No! We were s-so close!"

With pieces of his armour still falling off, Alfred stood up, grabbed both of us, and bolted into the mist exit with Scout swiftly following after.

...

-I-I-I-I-

...

Alfred ran and ran.

I couldn't bear to imagine how it would've felt to have to run after tanking the most powerful attack of a B-rank monster.

It must've hurt because as soon as he saw the end, he dove towards it.

The three of us collapsed into the ground, right in front of the wall of trees.

Not letting his guard down, the Scout pulled out a small knife and faced the entrance. I looked down the opening that served as the entrance to Viridescent's lair. Just like before, it was covered in thick mist that covered anything. Yet despite that, at the very end, in the far distance, was a shadowy figure. The shadowy figure was tall and had six arms... it was waving at us.

We heard a noise from above and something small from high up in the trees, fell towards us.

The person to catch the same object it was Yukari. It was a wooden cup. The same cup of poison that Yukari offered to Viridescent before the fight began.

The Reaper snicker, "Tch! Cocky bastard!"

She fainted after that.

I turned to the Scout and weakly said, "T-thank you...Scout. Thank you...Alfred."

That was all I could say before fainting.

...

-I-I-I-I-

...

My eyes still felt heavy. They could barely open. But from what I could see from my blurry vision, there was someone sitting near me, packing up something in their bag. Their hands were...covered in blur fur. Unless I was seeing things, their entire body was also covered in fur. I couldn't see what type of clothing they were wearing but...they had the face of a wolf who wore glasses.

They noticed my half opened eyes and stared. The unfamiliar figure raised what I assumed was their eyebrow and looked down at me with a questionable look.

"How are they?" I heard the voice of an Arthur fake come in.

"They should be dead." His voice was low and he spoke with a monotone.

"Should be, you say?"

"They'll live. The medicine should do its job. Honestly with people like these two, all you have to do is keep them alive long enough until their regeneration does the rest. Just make sure these two get lots of sleep and replace their bandages daily."

"Thank goodness...About the payment. Please follow me."

"Ahh yes, of course."

The two of them got up to leave.

"Just what exactly did these two fight?" He asked the Scout.

"A B-ranked monster."

"Are they mad?"

"Yes."

The rest of their conversation faded away.

I laid there in silence. I was still very sleepy. I was about to doze off. But then-

"Hey Summoner...you awake?" I heard the Reaper's voice gently call out from somewhere in the room.

"Yeah..."

"I told you it would work, didn't I?"

"You're insane, you know that?"

"Hahaha...I don't want to hear that from you."

...

-I-I-I-

...

You have unlocked a new summoning slot: 1/1 - to - 1/2.

...

-I-I-I-

...

Aria Current skills:

Passives:

- Chance Damage: Your Sword Strikes have a 5% chance of doing additional damage which equals up to 1% of your defence.

- Regeneration II: You will gradually heal HP over time. Rate of healing increases when asleep.

- Endurance II: Decreases damage taken.

- Quadruple Hit Endurance: Your defence will increase by 5% every-time you are hit. Can stack up to 20%. The defence boost will reset after the fourth hit or if 1 min have passed.

Active:

- Sword Strike: Deals 10 damage to target. CD: 5 Minutes.

- Defensive Gift: Increases a target's defence by 10% for 1 min. CD: 30 min.

- Shield Dash: Dashes forward at a rapid speed. Speed and damage dealt by the dash will equal to 50% of you defence. CD: 1 min. (Must be used with shield)

- Shield Enhance: Strengthens you're shield for 10 seconds. CD: 45 seconds.

- Bladed Mitigation: For the next 30 seconds, damage taken is reduced by 20% and damage is also reflected. CD: 10 minutes.

- Taunting Chain: Fires a chain that forces the target to battle you. CD: 5 seconds.

...

This chapter was finished on the 25/02/2022