The third floor is in a rectangle shape and our (mine and Damien´s) room is in the middle of one of the longer sides. After peeking through the door I saw that one side was almost fully clear of monsters, there were human corpses, evidently clearing that side wasn´t without cost. And on the other side, although there weren´t thaaat many monsters, there were still quite a few, and in front of most of the rooms there were one or two human corpses, but one or two cockroaches as well, except one room, but I saw a spider camping there.
"Which way should I take? Right is evidently much easier, but left would bring much more Level and if all the others were out before me, I need to catch up. And the hallway is also almost completely dark except a few lamps that are still running on the emergency electricity battery even after a few days, but they were shining very dimly. So the environment isn´t really in my favor. And how did Damien clear the monsters on the right path? I mean, it had to be Damien, right? Because the right path is more or less cleared from our room. I can ask him when I meet him. But for now I have other problems. So, right or left?"
After a moment of contemptation I decided to go right.
"I can always catch up, but my life is still more important than a few measly Levels."
I wanted to close the door, but then I remembered that the second cockroach destroyed it, so I just stood in my room, took deep breath and then crouchingly and as silent as possible went out. I a few meters, but then it seemed that a cockroach that was just chilling in a corner discovered me. I quickly used `Shadow Hide´ on the shadow of a random cockroach and hoped it didn´t discover me, but it did!
"Fuck!"
I decided to wait in the shadows hoping that after it approached me I could swiftly kill it and no other monster would notice, but my idea was shot down in the same second as the cockroach shrieked and alerted all the other monsters with that. Realizing I would get nowhere with hiding in the shadows and wasting my mana when the monsters searched for me, as there wasn´t enough prey for everyone to hunt and every monster hoped to be the one to find me, I deactivated `Shadow Hide´ and stabbed the cockroach I was hiding in the shadow of in the unprotected belly in the area I thought the heart should be.
[-18! Critical Hit!]
After stabbing another time the cockroach died.
[-2]
[You received 5 EXP]
I could finally see the extent of the army that was awaiting me. More than ten cockroaches and three spiders, but at least only two cockroaches were coming for me from the back, which was the right side after I turned to face the left side to see what I had to fight against. I quickly turned and ran further to the right side before I had to face two cockroaches that stood side by side and blocked the path completely. Before I could attack, the left cockroach jumped at me, but I jumped, and when I fell down, I landed on it´s head, that was in my previous position. I quickly stabbed it a few times and then tried jumping onto the other cockroach, but slipped on the eyes of the dead cockroach and fell on them.
*squish*
"Fuc.."
Just as I was about to curse, I was rudely interrupted by the other cockroach that was trying to.. bite me?! I rolled away, but the cockroach managed to scratch scratch me and thoroughly got splattered by a fluid from the eyes of the dead cockroach.
[-3]
"Fu..."
Just as I was about to curse again, I saw the monsters from the left side already catchin up, so I knew I had to do something.
"Shit! Raven Call*1!"
A raven appeared from the shadow of the corpse of the cockroach.
"Attack the other cockroach with Shadow Spike!"
Since the cockroach was standing directly under a dim lamp, it was standing on its own shadow.
[-20]
[You received 5 EXP and a Bread (Common)]
[You leveled up!]
Suddenly a not too severe pain assaulted me out of nowhere, but I decided to ignore it, since I couldn´t just say: Ey! Monsters! Stop for a minute, I´m not feeling too good! Let´s continue another time!
"Now get your ass out of here!", I said to the raven and ran further to the right, seeing the last obstacle in my way down. The spider!
When I saw it turning it´s backside to me to shoot the web, I swiftly threw the spear after I experienced how effective that technique was against the first cockroach.
[-27! Semi-Critical Hit!]
"Did the silk block the spear from causing a critical hit? Fuck!"
I ran to the spider before it could turn back and attempted another shameless move, which was pushing the spear deeper.
[-23! Critical Hit!]
[You received 15 EXP]
After taking the spear out, I ran to the next corner of the rectangle and sat down to rest for a minute since all the monsters were coming at me from the side I just came from and were still quite a distance away. I took out a common bread and the cheese sandwich, shoved it down my throat and then glanced at my status.
[Anthony Merin]
[Lvl. 3]
[15/30 EXP]
[Age: 21]
[Race: Human]
[Class: None]
[HP: 15/15]
[MP: 13]
[Soul Power: 760]
[Stamina: 31/53]
[Strength: 11]
[Defense (race-based): 2]
[Agility: 12]
[Dexterity: 15]
[Intelligence: 13]
[Instincts: 1]
[Talents]
[Combat Talents:
[Spear Talent (Low)]
[Sword Talent (Low)]
[Bow Talent (Low)]
[Utility Talents:
[Cooking Talent (Low)]
[Affinities:
[Rare Shadow (High)]
[Special Rare Raven (High)]
[Skills:
[Shadow Hide (First-Stage)]
[Hide in any Shadow near you by fusinc yourself with the Shadows.]
[Mana Cost: 1 Mana per 6 Seconds]
[Raven Call (First-Stage)]
[Call Ravens of equal Level to yours to help you]
[Mana Cost: 1 Mana the Raven per Second]
"My stats increased? I thought they only reflected my body?"
[You absorbed a part of you opponents stats and when you level up, they are released into your body, since it would be detrimental for it to be ainful after every enemy slain. Especially in a continuous battle]
"Oh, so that was the pain I felt after leveling up!"
But for now I still had to fight against nine cockroaches and two spiders, that were already running at me, but since the hallway was narrow, only two cockroaches or one spider could fit through side by side. And the rest of the fight was just good ol´ kiting around the rectangle. The only problem there was, were the level ups, but this time when I leveled up I was prepared already, so it wasn´t to much of an inconvenience. At the end my status looked like this (without the talents and skills part):
[Anthony Merin]
[Lvl. 5]
[20/50 EXP]
[Age: 21]
[Race: Human]
[Class: None]
[HP: 6/15]
[MP: 3/15]
[Soul Power: 780]
[Stamina: 24/55]
[Strength: 14]
[Defense (race-based): 2]
[Agility: 14]
[Dexterity: 17]
[Intelligence: 15]
[Instincts: 2]