When the first fish jumped at Hera, she slashed with her handaxe while taking a step back. It almost felt like she missed the attack, but then she looked back at the creature, now split in half. She used the Dwarven Hope Axe, which had the shadow buff. Maybe that was the reason why it felt so easy to kill it. Another snapper jumped from the water, surprising Hera. She awkwardly swung her weapon, hoping to just parry the attack. Instead, the blade caught the fish's belly and sunk deep into the monster's flesh. While Hera was still holding the monster on her handaxe, the creature's weight became too much for its body to bear and was ripped in half.

"This is ridiculous," Hera looked around.

Another fish came at her, but Daskka jumped from her shoulder towards the fish's mouth. Before the monster could even bite, the snake was already completely inside it. Hera stepped to the side, and her companion burst out of the beast, almost like a creature from a horror movie.

"Please do not rub all that blood on me," Hera asked.

Daskka smiled and started to slowly approach Hera.

"If you do that, I'll keep you in the necklace for a month. I swear. This thing is going to last eight hours. I just told you that," Hera spent the early 10 minutes of her shift explaining to Daskka what was going on, and the snake seemed excited about all the action.

Another fish came, and Hera dodged it before grabbing it by its tail and slamming the monster on the ground, killing it with the impact.

"This is way too easy," Hera looked around to check on the other people. Alex was barely moving. She was leaning against the wall and sending a wind blade each time a fish would pop out of the water. On the other side, Silah was using her metal plates to test some different ways of killing the fish. Making a large spinning tube filled with spikes wasn't working all that well, and her spinning saw blades struggled to hit the targets. Getting an idea, Hera yelled to her girlfriend. "Silah, try a net. Make it like a chainsaw."

"A chainsaw?" Silah asked.

"Yeah, the chain has small blades on every other link. Then you make it move at high speed kind of like a thread mill. Think you can do it?"

"Oh, got it! I'll try, thanks."

Seeing that the fishes didn't stop attacking even during their small conversation, Hera looked towards the lake, concerned about the lack of monsters in front of her. She half expected that the creatures would be almost getting to her now, but thankfully, Daskka was killing all of them. The snake would use her tail, fangs, poison, and spells to attack the incoming monsters, even going as far as jumping into the water to chase them away.

"Daskka, stay on the beach. Don't fight them in their home turf," Hera called her pet back. Daskka obliged, but she left a cloud of poison on the water before coming out. The monsters that passed through it would already come out in bad shape. All that Hera or Daskka had to do was to dodge and wait a couple of seconds for them to die.

Hera pressed the communicator, "Are rampages supposed to be this easy? The one in Brinnefront was much harder."

"That's normal, Sweetie. You are way too over-leveled to be training here. When was the last time you tried to fight in the Woolly Plains or in your dungeon?" Helena's voice was energetic. It seemed like she was enjoying herself.

"My dungeon?" Hera asked.

"The one you made with Blue on top of the mountain," Alex chimed in.

"Ah, I think I only went in once. I wanted to see what the hard mode would be like, but no one figured out how to trigger it yet," Hera replied, "and I don't have a reason to go to the Woolly Plains anymore. But my stats are not that higher."

"Hera, you almost doubled your stats, got a bunch of new equipment, and Silah's crazy buff is making our weapons behave like they are for someone at level 40. Of course, this would be ridiculously easy," Blue said.

"I get that, but explain why even spells are killing these things like they are nothing. I feel like I'm fishing with dynamite."

"Oh, that's a fun idea," Leo said. A few moments later, a large explosion happened underwater on the other side of the beach.

"The fuck was that?" Hera gasped.

"One of my bomb traps. I made that one small, but I was thinking about making a big one to blow up in the middle of the lake," Leo replied.

"Don't destroy our water supply, please. We can be mostly independent because of it," Silah asked.

"You're no fun," Leo sounded disappointed, but he didn't use that spell again.

However, that gave Hera an idea. She walked closer to the water and cast a grease fire in the water. As she expected, the liquid flame wasn't snuffed out in the water but burned on top of it, almost like it was oil. A couple of fishes jumped from the water and passed through the flames. When they hit the ground, the smell of fried fish began to spread. To ensure she wouldn't do any lasting damage, she dismissed the spell and watched as the flames vanished, leaving the water in the same condition as before she did anything.

"OK, my grease fire can cook any fish that jumps out. I might be able to cover a very wide area with that," Hera told everyone.

"We'll keep that in mind for the next ones. We also need to warn everyone to keep the water supply in mind."

Rangalian threw a lightning bolt in the water that spread out and killed about two dozen fishes who were now floating on the lake, motionless. Things seemed to be going pretty well, and since they had such a long time of waiting before the first monster appeared, no one needed a break. A part of the team even ate while everything was peaceful.

Piles and piles of fish were forming around everyone. Some were burnt or badly destroyed, but many were just there and could even be used as food. The problem would be that the people of Boothudurn didn't actually know how to prepare fish, not to mention the possibility that these monsters were poisonous. They didn't look like it, but in a world where pufferfish were considered level 1 creatures, they had to be careful.

Hera noticed that these snappers were getting bigger. The first few ones looked like small dogs, now some that were the size of a German Shepherd already appeared. If that continued, there could be some truly massive monsters coming from the lake. One weird thing was that she couldn't tell where the monsters were actually coming from. They were appearing in the lake, yes, but she couldn't see their spawning point. In reality, this happened everywhere in the MAZE. During a rampage, no one was ever able to find where the monsters were spawning from. Even when groups tried to follow the trail of monsters, they would eventually realize that they had gone too far. A theory that most people accepted was that the MAZE hid that from the people and either made monsters spawn in places where no one was looking or distorted the perception of anyone who was staring at the spawning point.

When the next fish jumped out of the water, Hera triggered her [Observe].

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Brown-Fin Snapper - Level 8 - (Scale affinity)

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"They are getting stronger!" Hera yelled.

"I'm still one-shotting them," Alex replied.

"Me too, but keep in mind that it might change."

"Roger," Alex replied as two more wind blades came out of her weapons.

Daskka seemed to be having a blast during the fight. She would chase the fish around and even try to juggle two of them using her tail.

"I never told you not to play with your food, have I?" Hera asked, receiving a head shake as a reply, "Fine, do it just during the rampage. After that, I'm teaching you some manners."

Daskka put out her tongue, almost like she was taunting Hera, and kept playing with the fish carcasses. Silah was now sitting with her back against the wall, and a large net was covering the 30-meter wide area that she was protecting. Every time a fish tried to jump, it would land on the ground and be minced into bits. Hera warned her girlfriend that doing that would damage the materials they could get from it, but Silah was more worried about defending the city. Alex used a version of her wind blades that worked more as stabs than slashes.

Hera turned to Daskka and asked her to use the floating mist spell on her. Since this fight was really easy, she might as well train the Dorohla Style. With the buff affecting her, she felt like she was using rollerblades. However, the spell allowed her to move freely in all directions. When she first tried to use that spell, Hera felt like she was struggling to walk through the ice, but now she was already proficient on it. In swift motions, she was almost dancing around the snappers that came out of the water. Daskka joined using the floating mist to fly around Hera. Because of the snake's weight, she could fly at low heights with the same spell that allowed her owner to just glide in the ground.

The clock kept ticking while everyone got to a good rhythm in the rampage. Not a single of them was having any problems while facing the fish. If anything, the issue was now what to do with all the bodies littering the beach. Hera used her grease fire on the water to keep the monsters away for a moment and pulled up her tablet to look at the dungeon quest while taking a break to drink some water. The moment she looked at the numbers, she almost spat out her drink.

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Monster Rampage - Boothudurn Peaks

Protect the city from the waves of monsters that will attack the settlements. Any damage to the room structures will be deducted from the basic reward.

Rewards: 20 000 gold

Killing a monster will give you increased rewards based on the type of monster.

Any monster - 103 kills

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"How did I kill so many?" Hera was coughing, trying to get her bearings.

She looked up and compared her pile with Silah and Alex's. They seemed more or less the same size, although the one by her girlfriend was more uniform since all the fish were minced. It was only the first day, and they fought for less than half their shift. Yet, somehow, she managed to kill more than what she got in the first rampage she participated in. The rest of the teams would have a full day and a massive reward that could easily double the base reward that the guild was offering.

Everyone was distracted, killing the monsters when the next team arrived. Helena stepped away from her position to talk to the people who were coming and explain everything that was going on. Together with the guild clerk, they explained how things should work and how to split their time so people could take breaks. After that, the next team took their places while Hera and the others took care of the numerous fish bodies in the area. They weren't going bad, but the smell was an assault on the senses. For the first time, Hera took a moment to actually look at the monsters. Each fish was very similar to tuna, but they had a dull brown color and fins that looked more like something a shark would have. Another odd thing was that touching their scales felt like touching dried-up soil, despite the monsters living in the water.

After carrying the loot back to the guild, Hera, her team, and the dwarves were lucky since they could all stay in their houses. Unlike the previous attack, since many people were staying in the city to keep everyone safe, there was no need to make use of the bunks in the guild, not that it would even be possible with the number of people still in Boothudurn. The other humans stayed there instead of the hotel, following the regular rampage protocols.

Hera managed to find Mark, but he was too busy to talk. Now that the first shift was already over, there were a lot of weapons and armor that needed tending. When she got back to her place, everyone asked her to take a shower quickly. Despite not being the worst one at long range, she was the one who got closer to the fish she killed, and the stank showed. Blue punched a couple of them but then created a storm cloud above the water that electrocuted any fish that jumped out.

Despite knowing that Helena and the others also wanted a shower, Hera just laid down in the tub, soaking in the bubbles. Even if someone were to complain about it, she wouldn't care. Daskka was also in the tub. After a while, Hera became comfortable enough to be with the construct during her baths. It also helped that the snake didn't have to breathe or use the bathroom and she understood the limits of what she could do in those situations. While watching Daskka rest her head on her knee, Hera started to think about the rampage. She hoped that there wouldn't be any wendigos this time, but considering her luck, she doubted that.