It was a group of beasts with a dense aura of Death. While they weren't too strong, only as much as the Alligators, they were troublesome opponents. Because of their innate aura, they inflicted a lot of detrimental statuses if they managed to hit, and because of the environment, their power were buffed up.
The next problem that arose, was that it seemed they could sense our presence easily, so a lot of them came swarming in whenever one managed to spot us, making each fight quite hard.
Surprisingly, the Barbarians could hold quite well despite being unable to nullify the detrimental statuses, it felt that something different was bolstering up their strength besides Juran's buffs.
The Scardinians didn't seem to have a problem in going through the enemies, seemingly used to this environment and the monsters. But something what really surprised me was Juran.
While Zenith was like a fish in the water because of his innate attributes, even being buffed up by this environment, Juran didn't fall behind at all. He felt like a natural nemesis of this place, easily being able to vanquish monsters he couldn't before. The other thing that surprised me was the resonance that Kagito had with Juran.
While Kagito's aura gave us a nice buff, it seemed to interact with Juran's joyfully, as if finding a longtime friend. Both of them were bewildered at that, as it had never happened before, but it was great nonetheless. So, they fought forward while increasing the strength of the group by a large factor.
Now, we are in the middle of fighting another crazy horde of beast monster, each of their movements wild and vicious, not caring for their 'life' at all.
"Juran! Zenith!" I shout to my two companion that seems to have their share of fun while fighting on the frontlines to catch their attentions, a few monsters are coming from behind us this time, which is very troubling,
Zenith, noticing about it, acts fast and goes to the back end of our formation while Juran falls, back for a bit, and closes to Kagito, both of them becoming the center of our group as that would maximize the buffs give. I increase my destructive force as I start going forward, Isa deflecting monsters to my side while blocking most of them.
Seeing a couple of them in front of me, a leopard like one jump to me while some kind of lion jumps to my side. Both of my sword move at the same time as gust of concentrated divine magic comes from me, thanks to the buffs of everyone, I could somehow create it, just barely, to increase my power against these troublesome fellows.
While the leopard attacked me with its giant jaw, biting to me frantically, the lion opted to give me a full blow attack with its right paw. I stop the leopard's charge easily with my Dark Coat, while I nullify the attack of the Lion with one of my swords, and my other sword, while shining brightly and imposingly, slashed it, cutting it like a hot knife cutting butter.
The leopard seems to go in a craze as it attacks my Dark Coat again, 'ripping' it apart. But what came out of that was my two swords rapidly severing its head.
All of that took just a bit of time as I jump at the next monster in line that are coming to me. Isa's control of who to let go and who not, while expertly dealing as much damage as she can has gotten superb!
We quickly shave off the horde of monster, I look back to see how they are faring back there as the sound of clashes are ongoing.
Zenith is keeping the back end, like a furious storm killing any and all monsters going around him or severely injure them for the others to dispose of them easily. The Scardinians were taking turn to support each side whenever they saw a gap being created, and we could assert something from this group.
They are strong!
But the ones that really have shown off is Grudell and Isca.
Isca seems like a true beast going wild with his weapon, it was a sword as big as him, with its blade seemingly like a hacksaw and its back with a dangerous curve at the end. The monsters that got to him were ripped to pieces and from time to time, when there was none close to him, he pulled out a big longbow and shot off a ferocious arrow that pierced more than one monster.
Grudell, on the other hand, held more finesse but was equally crazy while shooting cold blooded arrow precisely, injuring monsters timely or swiftly killing those that were injured. His shooting speed was astoundingly fast, no monster coming even 5 meters of him. Truly, if I didn't see him using a bow, I would have thought that he had the Gunslinger class too. Though, his fire rate was still slower than Vladi's, it was still very impressive.
Soon enough, all enemies were dead, loot consisting of gold and materials appears. 'Maybe this dungeon is a godsend opportunity to increase Zenith's strength.'
Thinking about the loot, a lot of them were material that were infested with death, taking that into account, that helped us a lot to bring the overall strength of Zenith up with new equipment, accessories or consumables.
While thinking that as I moved to grab and place the loot to have it all organized and neat, we start dividing it accordingly.
"The enemies is getting tougher, and the death aura more concentrated, it seems we are almost at that part, right?" I look at Grudell to confirm my thoughts and he nods.
"Yes, the density starts increasing as we get to the deviation between spaces. While we have encountered a few small ones, they have nothing to do with the ones that sends us to the core places of this Dungeon." Then he frowns and looks ahead, adding "And maybe your presence has caused more changes than we initially thought, I feel this won't be a normal run through of this place"
I contemplate the meaning of those words and, before I talk again, Isa says, "So, a dangerous foe is waiting for us, then." Then she pushes her shield forward and stabs it to the ground, sending a small tremor on this place, "Let it come!"
Arksen chuckles while hearing that and says with his hands grabbing behind his head in a laid-back manner, "And I AM the hot blooded one, heh"
Isa looks at him with a pout and then looks elsewhere. The tense atmosphere vanished just like that as everyone smiled and we continue walking forward.
Crushing our way through!
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Aren was thoughtful.
Despite being a Barbarian, and quite a hot blooded one, he actually thought a lot.
Why was he weaker when he actually looked physically stronger than others? How did magic work? Why was it so hard for him while for others it was so easy? Why did his race optimized for physical power instead of a mana ruled one? Sharp or blunt weapons?
He always came up with questions on his quest to become stronger and stronger, not ceasing for one bit. He knew that just blindly trusting raw power would yield to nothing, one had to know its origin and its core, one had to train in manipulating it to develop the best output, as his close friend Ardha says.
So besides of training his muscles, sharpening his sword skills, maintaining his weapons and killing monsters, he also thought.
And right now, his current thinking resided in the strange auras everyone enveloped themselves with, and why they weren't able to do that.
Inferiority did hit him, but he knew that he couldn't just mop around saying 'He wasn't talented enough'. He had to try, do his utmost, crush every part of himself. If there was something that he took pride in as a Barbarian, was their unyielding spirit to become stronger!
Thus, he felt. The detrimental status on themselves weren't really all that great, and while they were annoying, it seemed to be counterbalanced by something else. They could still move agilely as if nothing was going on and could wield their weapons and exert their strength without stop, they only felt more fatigued than normal by the end of the battles.
He knew he was getting stronger, but the reason of this state was something else. Something beyond 'simple' power, it was a bit more complex, yeah, like 'complex' power.
Aren stroke his chin like Ardha usually does when he thinks, who knew, maybe that action would give him more insight.
As he continued fighting on and on against the monsters in this dungeon, the feeling became more noticeable to him, or simply put, he was more sensitive towards it as he was always concentrated.
It was something 'inside' his body. That 'something' was slowly going around his body all the time, it felt very weird as he never noticed it. It felt truly faint, but because of the constant exertion, and his awareness, it became noticeable.
He tried to see if he could manipulate 'it' but failed to do so. He didn't even have a grasp over what 'it' was.
He thought of asking his companions, but something made him shut up. He wanted to look into it by himself, he wanted to prove himself that he could get stronger too, by thinking this time.
Maybe he would never get an answer, but deep inside him, he knew that this was his trial of fire. Maybe if he asked, he would be enlightened on what to do, but for some reason, he thought he would ultimately fail. Or so his instincts told him.
He trusted himself and resolution shows in his eyes as he advances forward with them.
Without knowing, he had made a firm step forward toward his goal.
Power!
And even more than just personal power…
Aren smiled and snorted satisfied.
Everyone looked at him and he laughed awkwardly and then looked at the other Barbarians beside him, they didn't look like it, but they were the new generation.
So he grinned widely and led the group this time.
Nothing will get in his way for his goal!
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Ignoring the strange behavior of Aren, we simply kept going forward, it has been already more than a day we came here, and we had to hurry up.
Fighting against a couple more hordes of monsters, we noticed that the density of death was becoming greater and greater.
Soon enough we stopped as the density of death seemed to distort, as we felt clearly two streams of it.
"We are here" Says Grudell with an impassive, but serious voice.
Zenith nods quietly, and I talk "The density of the death element over there is… too huge!" a frown forms on my face.
"It is!" Grudell nods, serious, "While the density over here is always abnormal, now it feels that it has greatly increased!"
Sighing, Kagito says, "Truly, nothing ever comes easy," while smiling bitterly. He should have felt it too. There is an abnormal presence ahead, probably something generated by the strong deathly energy.
Aren walks forward determinedly and says, "What use is there waiting, then? Let's go!". Hearing that, Arksen laughs and walks besides Aren while lifting his fist high.
"Let's go!" He shouts with a silly grin on his face.
Chuckling at that, we all get fired up and lifts our fists in the air and shout alongside each other,
""Let's go!!!!!""
As we already felt the enemy presence on the other room, it was obvious that I had felt us too. There was no use in trying to surprise attack it, so we just prepared swiftly, getting into formation.
Determination showing on our faces, as our fighting intent soars on the sky!