Ankhegs are an invasive species that live underground. For centuries, they have remained as one of the biggest threats for underground explorers, primarily living in burrows deep under the earth and attacking mines, dungeons, and other underground formations. The insectoid beasts can grow up to two meters long, and evolutions can grow up to five meters. Ankheg populations have been dwindling over the past fifty years, and Welton’s Furnace has reported less attacks from said monsters. Only a handful of attacks have occurred in the past five years. The Ankheg Queen was last sighted over four decades ago, destroying several villages upon rising to the surface. Although this presents a different problem; something was capable of exterminating this resilient species that plagued nearly half the continent, and it is likely that this new species could replace the Ankhegs as the most prevalent underground monsters. Will the surface be ready for the potential rising of a more dangerous species to take its place?

~ A research paper based on monster populations.

At the split second before their blades clashed, Damien’s world turned into darkness. His sword hit nothing but air. A powerful kick took the vampire by surprise, and he rolled on the ground, escaping the sphere of darkness.

His relief didn’t last long, as Chester’s fist came flying down on his head. Damien’s quick reflexes allowed him to dodge to the side before getting up.

The ground creaked under the sheer force, but held strong under the man’s punch.

“Don’t hold back, otherwise it’ll end up like last time. Show me what you’ve got.”

The darkness faded away to reveal the unarmored man. He wielded the dagger in a reverse-grip, opening his stance in a taunting manner.

Damien’s pride stung upon remembering their first fight. Taking his advice, he activated his Darkness Infusion. A subtle black aura exuded itself from his body and weapon, increasing all his stats by a small margin.

“Darkfire.”

Flames made of shadow erupted from his palm, forcing Chester to dodge left as a small explosion enveloped where he once stood.

The vampire intercepted him, drawing his sword from a low angle to catch the man by surprise.

Adamantium and mithril met with a loud clang, and Chester showed no signs of struggle in the contest of strength despite the boy using both hands. Damien tried to sweep his legs underneath him, but the man parried the blow, reacting far faster than anticipated. The steel armoring the vampire’s shins didn’t disturb him at all.

Damien reacted with a second kick, landing on the left side of the illusionist's torso. A small wince was all that the man gave as a reaction.

Chester responded with a vicious blow to the gut, targeting the chainmail. It provided little protection against blunt damage, allowing the man to deliver a great amount of damage using his knuckle dusters.

“Agh!”

The boy crumpled to the ground, but got up as fast as he could. Damien’s face was contorted in agony.

His mind worked to its maximum limit, trying to devise a plan against Chester as he slowly closed the distance.

‘Stat-wise he’s likely got more than me in everything, but he doesn’t have a lot of offensive skills in his arsenal. Guess I’ll have to keep my distance.’

He retreated further, with the man following closely. The vampire kept him at bay, using his full arsenal of dark spells.

“Shadow Bolt,” A burst of dark mana mimicking electricity aimed at Chester’s torso, which he couldn’t react to fast enough due to the short distance. It wrapped itself around him, causing a painful tingling sensation throughout.

Warning! You are paralyzed for 1 second.

Damien launched towards him at great speeds. A second spell, Darkfyre, left his hand and rocketed towards the vulnerable man. Chester braced himself for the incoming explosion.

Just before it made contact his spell bounced back, rocketing towards himself at great speeds. His eyes widened at the unexpected result, and he called out his only protective spell.

“Shadowshield!”

A barrier made of corporeal darkness spawned right between him and the flames. He came out unharmed, but at a much lower mana reserve than he was used to. Slinging spells at this rate came at a steep price.

He coughed violently, getting up and readying himself for any attacks.

“Damn, that was close.” Chester said, now free from the paralysis and patting the dust off his shoulders.

RING OF DEFLECTION

- Low tier spells have a small chance of being reflected back onto the enemy.

- Weight: 0.1kg

The gang leader’s rings came in handy. He was fully expecting painful retribution, eyeing the injured boy.

“Looks like you’re done. Wanna stop now?”

Damien shook his head, holding his sword tightly in one hand. He had dispelled the Darkness Infusion, as it drained him of his mana steadily.

Chester shrugged, before turning invisible.

The vampire’s ears perked up, detecting footsteps to his left. He threw himself to the side, while dropping another Darkfyre spell where he once stood.

This time, his spell struck his invisible target. Black flames impacted something in mid-air, deactivating Chester’s invisibility and knocking him to the ground in a powerful explosion.

“Ugh, fuck. That actually really hurts.” He winced, ears ringing and skin slightly singed. Although he wasn't wearing any armor, his body was tough and he hadn't expected the spell to hurt so badly.

HP: 593/670 (6.8 HP regen/min)

Chester checked his health, surprised to see that his health had gone down a tenth from that one blow. It seemed the boy’s spells were potent, even without a class. The boy's strategic mind surpassed his, and he knew that without the ring he would've been in worse shape.

‘Scary, really scary…’

“What’re you waiting for? Come on!” Damien shouted, looking at him with a fiery determination.

The vampire’s vision turned into nauseating patterns, as Chester’s figure became clad in a multicolored kaleidoscope. It was hard to differentiate between the surroundings and his opponent.

He used his hearing to compensate, tracking the blows and doing his best to parry. His mana worked to dispel the Hypnotic Pattern, returning his vision back to normal.

The earth crumbled under his feet, and Damien froze for a single moment, realizing that it was an illusion. That was long enough for the illusionist to dash forward and sucker punch the boy in the face.

Cheek swollen and bruised, the vampire exuded an aura of darkness once again. With the added boost, he unleashed a set of blows that pressured Chester backwards. Off-guard due to his increased aggressiveness, it opened up a blow towards the man’s face. The pommel hit him in the teeth, turning his lips into a bloody mess.

A vein throbbed on his forehead, anger bubbling in the pit of his stomach. The man regretted going easy on the boy.

“One thing you should know about me.” He spat out a bloodied glob of spit. “I really, really hate losing.”

Damien laid down on the floor, exhausted and beaten. Chester did his best to avoid damaging the boy’s brand new armor; mainly because he had paid for it. So he decided to use the dagger for deflecting sword strikes only. He stuck to his brass knuckles and illusion spells instead, both as a handicap and to train his skills further.

The vampire’s face was bruised and battered and he winced with every move. Chester suffered from a busted lip and a deep gash on his side after a brutal slash to the abdomen. Their wounds had already begun to heal as they rested on the floor.

Chester held back most of his moves, knowing that most of them were far too brutal to execute in a training spar. In the wild, he had developed an animalistic combat style that relied on sheer brutality, and his defense against humans was to go for critical points such as the groin, eyes, and joints. He decided that brutalizing the boy to win the spar was counterproductive and extremely unethical; regardless of his feelings regarding winning and losing.

“That was…humbling.” The vampire confessed. He drank the health potions, feeling a comfortable warmth spread throughout his body. Bruises faded, and his battered body began to heal at an accelerated rate.

“Don’t beat yourself up. The fact you could do all this without a class is already damn impressive.” He encouraged the boy, taking one health potion for himself. “You’re like what, level eighteen or something, right?”

MEDIUM HEALING POTION

- Restore 50 HP upon consumption.

- Weight: 0.2kg

“Level fifteen.”

“Goddamn! Must be lucky to be born strong from the get go.”

Damien snorted. “I’m detecting some jealousy in your voice.”

“Ah, you’re getting smart with me, eh?!” He trapped the boy between his elbow and forearm in a headlock, giving him a painful noogie to the head. In his weakened state, he was unable to break out of the man’s grip.

Chester liked the pleasant feeling that numbed his pain. The wound on his side had mended itself together, accelerating the healing process by tenfold. All that was left was a small scar. There were some nagging injuries, but he opted to let them heal naturally. The man was not a fan of wasting potions.

“How are you so strong?” Damien questioned. “Are you even human? What did you do to get this powerful?”

The vampire knew humans possessed less benefits than vampires did. Although they suffered from almost no natural drawbacks, they were weak; with only five stat points per level as opposed to a vampire’s ten.

Damien had been raised with the idea that even humans double his level would not be a match for him as long as he kept up his training. He hadn't expected a lowly thief to disable him so easily.

“I got unlucky, I suppose. Living in the forest does things to you.” Chester stretched out his arms, having taken off his shirt. His tattoos were in full display, giving the lean man an intimidating vibe. “Besides, it doesn’t matter if I told you. It’s impossible to replicate.”

He doubted that the glitch he discovered would work ever again. Even then, he was hesitant to tell others. Knowledge was power, and Chester was uncomfortable with giving it away so freely.

Chester shuddered to think about how strong the boy would’ve been with a glitch that quadrupled his stat points.

‘From what I know, vampires get ten per level. So that would mean he’d get forty…Unfair. Not only does he get perfect skin, a nice face, and a rich family, he has double the points I started off with!’ He narrowed his eyes, full of jealousy.

The boy in question looked at him with a raised brow. “Why are you glaring at me?”

Chester turned away, crossing his arms. “You’re imagining things. Anyway, we still have an hour and a half left for the rental. What time’s your fight?”

“Midnight. We have a few hours to rest.”

The vampire went off to practice his swordsmanship, and synergized it with his magical abilities, thinking of potential moves and strategies for the match. Chester recalled the book, and the parchment Cerebella had given him, honing his illusion skills further to learn the Dream skill.

‘Okay, focus on bringing up images faster. I need to have a set of ideas ready to summon whenever I get into a fight.’

Chester began by casting his Minor Illusion spell. He meticulously crafted and shaped mana to his will. Mana manipulation was an aspect of his skills that he had left underdeveloped; opting to focus on honing his physical stats to compete with the monsters in the forest.

A spot on the ground began to crack open, revealing an extraordinarily deep hole that should’ve been impossible because of the tower’s structure. It was much more detailed compared to his illusion in the spar, but that was due to the rush he was in to set it up.

He inspected his creation, fine tuning it so that it looked realistic, and adding shadows to make it look much deeper.

With the construct in mind, he repeated the spell once again, casting it twice as fast. The stronger and clearer the image of the illusion in his mind, the faster it came to life.

He toyed with the versatile spell; realizing its utility was nigh-unmatched. Although the size of the illusion was limited to a cubic meter, there were a lot of things he could create with that handicap in mind.

A fireball turned into a decapitated head. With some more mana, he could mimic sound as well, but he had trouble timing the sound with the illusion. It would require more practice to weave sound and sight together into a single illusion.

It was complicated. Horribly so. Shaping mana to make illusions was one of the most difficult things he had done, but by the end of the session, he had earned great rewards. A mentally exhausted Chester raised his fist in triumph.

Your understanding of illusion magic has deepened. Illusion Mastery is now Level 3.

You have experienced a breakthrough. Minor Illusion is now Level 2.

He was now conjuring detailed illusions in less than a second, and practiced the illusion of a hole forming on the ground, along with others mimicking elemental magic. The speed at which he improved was remarkable.

Chester and Damien exited the room, entered a long, winding hallway that led to the staircase. It was ridiculously large, and the Illusionist suspected some sort of spatial magic at work to cram all this space into a single floor.

When they entered the tower, it was close to midday. Damien had little rest between the battles, shopping, training, and sparring. He wanted to rest as much as possible before the fight. Chester joined him, returning to the inn and flopping down onto the bed with a sigh. The vampire had passed out as soon as he entered, snoozing away without a care in the world.

He continued his practice of illusion magic, wanting to improve it as fast as possible. The man had learned about the existence of the Black Market after a conversation with Damien, and wanted to see if there was anything he could use there.

Chester quickly made a list of things to do.

‘First off, I need to find that gang leader. Jack…Something. I forgot.’ The man conjured an origami crane, before turning it into a bird. He made it hop around, flapping its wings. ‘I think he was some sort of information broker. I could use him.’

‘I’ll need to get a layout plan for the Corpsfield Warehouse. Then I’ll see what security’s like for myself. Hopefully the gang leader has something worthwhile.’

Unlike with his vampire companion snoozing on the bed, he was willing to go through any means to force the gang leader into his schemes. During their battle, he realized just how far ahead he was compared to regular people. For a brief moment he wondered if he could just brute force his way into the warehouse. The only thing that stopped his confidence from going out of hand was the presence of other powerful people.

The bandits in Pesodonia had put up little resistance against him and Damien. He remembered the first bandit he struck, expecting the man to go down in a single hit.

Chester forgot that he had transcended human limits a long time ago.

He could feel the man’s skull cave in. It bent inwards and his eyeballs popped out due to the sheer force. The illusionist had no clue that humans were so frail compared to the monsters he fought in the forest.

You have slain Human (Level 6)

He could vividly remember it. The first time he killed another human being, watching the light disappear from his eyes as blood pooled underneath the corpse. Chester was numb; he watched as the other bandits backed up in fear for their lives.

‘Even the lower level monsters didn’t die from one hit. How could I have known these guys would just die like that?’

For the rest of the fight, he refused to hit anywhere remotely lethal. The man resorted to breaking limbs and bones to incapacitate his foes. All the bandits were turned into the local soldiers, and the poor village treated Damien and Chester like heroes.

‘I thought it was a fluke, and that people would be stronger in the cities. But even here, the local criminals can’t do shit.’

He wasn’t foolish enough to assume he was the strongest. The tall, imposing mage who called for Cerebella came to mind. It was better to be vigilant and collect as much information.

From what he read, the level twenty milestone increased people’s powers significantly. The stat boosts and class-exclusive skills made a massive difference in combat performance. If he were in a fight against multiple people with classes, Chester knew he would be in trouble.

‘Ideally, the operation goes off without a hitch and I don’t have to fight. But just in case…’

Before he knew it, three hours had passed. Damien woke up to the sound of a fireball rocketing towards his face.

“GAH!”

He scrambled out of the bed, falling and landing on his buttocks. The flames dissipated into wisps of mana, and the sound of Chester’s laughter reverberated throughout the room.

A scuffle ensued, and Damien kicked him in the groin for his prank. After getting dressed, the duo went to grab food before the fight started. The area was far from the restaurant district; and the buildings were primarily geared towards adventurers. Although there were food places, they weren’t as varied.

“They don’t allow potions in the arena, right?”

The vampire shook his head. “No, we’re only allowed to bring our personal equipment.”

Both agreed on eating at a large and busy tavern. The fine hardwood floors and warm lights made for a comfortable atmosphere. A few individuals were in the tavern; some drinking alone, and others in small groups.

They ordered an assortment of meat dishes, with three loaves of bread to share between themselves. An older woman from behind the counter could be seen cooking their food on an open flame.

After several minutes, the waiter served them their food; fried fish, beef ribs covered in a dark brown sauce, and a potato meat stew.

“Ah, this is the stuff!” Chester took a bite of everything, finding that the beef ribs were especially good. Damien ate faster than before, but his manners remained top-notch. A few whispered and pointed at Damien, clearly having recognized him; likely from his presence in the Finamore Tournament. Nobody had approached them.

“Hey, these ribs are amazing! Can I have a second plate?”

“Coming up! I’m glad you enjoyed them; they’re fresh out the dungeon.”

Chester stopped chewing for a moment. “...These are dungeon monsters?”

The old man nodded. “Minotaur ribs. Delicious and packed with protein!”

He shrugged, deciding that there was no problem eating dungeon monsters. Chester had eaten monsters in the forest, and deciding that ones from a dungeon weren't any worse.

‘The more I know, I guess. Fast food ribs probably come from shadier places than that.’

Within half an hour, all that remained were empty plates and full stomachs. Both sighed in satisfaction, content with the food.

The total cost came down to five silver, a fee that Chester didn’t hesitate to pay. He was of the mindset that good service should be rewarded when you have the right resources. Dine and dashing was a last resort he only used when on his last dollar. He didn't want to be blacklisted from his favorite restaurants.

Making their way towards the coliseum, Damien stretched his arms out. His armor glinted under the moonlight, looking like a child soldier with the sword attached to his hip. Chester’s face shifted back into the façade he had last night, sharing many features with the pale vampire boy.

The man gave him a few words of encouragement as they separated, off to separate locations of the arena. Just before Damien left towards the fighter’s preparation rooms, he patted him down, adjusting the vampire’s armor and mumbling about ‘making sure everything is strapped in’.

“Please head to your personal warm-up room. If you have any requests, please let the attendant outside your room know. The round will begin in an hour and a half.” The receptionist explained as she walked him down the massive halls of the coliseum.

He nodded his head, sharpening his focus for the upcoming battle.