With less of them wandering around it is a lot easier to find one alone and isolated. As soon as I do I recreate the rapiers, activate Target Weakness, and attack. As soon as I activate the skill red spots appear on the ettin, they are bright and easy to spot.

Some of the spots even indicate the direction the strike should follow to do the most damage. It is truly a remarkable skill and it is going to make killing the ettins much easier. After killing my second ettin I would guess that the skill allowed me to kill it with about fifty strikes less.

While that might not seem like much of a difference, it saves me a couple of minutes. Meaning I can move on to finding the next ettin that much sooner, over time it will add up to a significant amount of time. Considering there are hundreds of ettins, anything that improves my efficiency is a fairly big deal.

Sure, I could just kill the fifteen required by the quest, but then that would leave all the rest to join the monster army. Even with a higher rate of killing speed, if I want to kill all of the ettins it is going to take a couple of days at least. Especially since I have to return to town each day to train my troops for a couple of hours.

As I am thinking about time, and how to make the most of it, I find another solo ettin. Immediately, I attack it, using rapiers and the new skill, to wear it down over several minutes. Ettins are incredibly strong, almost as strong as an ogre, but much like the ogre they are also very slow.

Once I get to attacking and dancing around the ettin it really has no hope of hitting me. During the entire fight it doesn't even manage to face me, it is so slow to turn that I have plenty of time to move. That is, as long as I keep my focus and don't slip up, the ettin has no chance at all of hitting me.

Under the constant barrage of attacks, eventually the third ettin dies, just like the second did. After a minute to catch my breath I move on looking for another ettin to kill. When I find it I repeat the process and start attacking it like a maniac, but there is a problem.

It turns out I didn't check the area around it thoroughly enough, there is another ettin close by. It responds to the roars of the one I am attacking and charges into the fight. Now I find myself in the situation I was trying so hard to avoid, fighting two ettins at once.

All my plans go out the window when fighting two ettins, I can't just stay behind one the whole time attacking it. Every time I try the other attacks me and forces me to dodge, giving the other a chance to turn around and attack. I end up spending more time dodging than I do attacking, meaning this fight will take forever.

The fight continues like this for twenty minutes, with me only occasionally being able to get an attack in. Then my luck kicks in, when I dodge the attack of one ettin it hits the other ettin instead. It immediately stops attacking as its two heads start arguing about which was at fault for hitting the other ettin.

Quickly taking advantage I focus on attacking the other ettin as much as I can while the other ettin is arguing with itself. I manage to bring the one ettin down to about half health before the other ettin wakes up and resumes attacking me. Now with one ettin heavily wounded and bleeding profusely I have an easier time facing two at once.

Focusing all my attacks on the heavily wounded one I plan to kill it first and then fight the other one on one. Unfortunately, my plan is ruined as the worst thing possible happens, I run out of sacred power. It is my own fault, I wasn't keeping track like I should have been, when my rapiers fade and I try to recast them.

Insufficient Sacred Power!

SP: 20/1725

It has been so long since this happened in a fight that I am not prepared at all. Suddenly, all I have are my hands and claws, not a good situation for me at all. The one ettin might eventually bleed out and die, but the other is almost completely unharmed.

'This is all because I became overconfident and got cocky!!'

Now my choices are to fight without weapons, or run away and find a place to hide and rest. For the moment I just focus on dodging their attacks while I consider my options and odds. I would like to at least finish off the wounded one before I run away, otherwise I have wasted a lot of time.

While I have enough power left to use Target Weakness four more times I decide to save it for now. After all, I can just target all the spots where the ettin is already bleeding. I can't remember the last time I actually used my claws in a fight, but I really don't want to run away.

So I focus on dodging their attacks until I find an opportunity to counterattack against the weakened one. Even with the rapiers getting through the ettin's thick hide was a challenge so I am not expecting much from my claws. However, to my surprise, my claws go through the ettin's hide as if it was made of paper.

Thinking it was because I hit an existing wound I turn to the undamaged ettin and attack it with my claws. Again my claws tear through it easily, I simply can't believe it, it doesn't make sense to me. How are my claws going through the ettin's hide easier than rapiers created by my Mage Knight Blade ability?

I know for a fact that the last time I used my claws in a fight they were nowhere near this powerful. So how exactly did my claws become my most powerful weapon without me realizing it? Turning back to the injured ettin, I decide to think about it later, as I instead focus on killing my enemy first.

At this point I don't even really need to focus on trying to target its weak points. Anywhere my claws hit gets torn open easily, I can make my own weak points to exploit. It is especially effective when I target joints, wrists and elbows slow and weaken its attacks, knees and ankles slow its movement.

After seeing how effective this new combat method is I am tempted to stop using weapons all together. After all, none of my other weapons can do this much damage or pierce defenses this well. Just imagine if I paired this with a martial art, I could become an unstoppable monk!