After leaving the base to go hunt, Sebastian ran into a few powerful beasts and purposefully got himself injured. He did this to meet the requirements of activating his passive skill, 'War Body' but after a while, he noticed it wasn't activating.
'I shouldn't be surprised this skill couldn't be exploited like this. After all, previous Apostles of War would have likely had their names written throughout history as the strongest, if this skill was exploitable.' Sebastian thought.
Looking at his fire, he noticed his meat was slightly burnt and quickly grabbed it. While eating the meat, he looked East and felt a strong force of energy gathering.
'I wonder what's happening there?' He questioned. 'They probably got it."
Swoosh!
Out from the forest, a wolf-like beast with spikes running along its back appeared and lunged forward. Before the beast could do anything, it was grabbed and held in the air.
"Woah! What do you think you're doing?"
Struggling, the beast's tail expanded into spikes until they shot outwards. Taken by surprise, he felt a couple spikes penetrate his skin and dropped the beast out of pain.
Angered by the beast's surprise attack, he chased after it and arrived at a portal. Assuming the beast had went thought the portal, he slowly walked toward it.
"A yellow portal? What kind of treasure awaits me here?" He said.
Slowly approaching the portal, he put his hand near the portal and remembered what happened last time he went through a golden portal.
'What's the worst that could happen?' He shrugged.
A bright flash blinded him upon entry and opened his eyes a few seconds later. Having opened his eyes, he saw as multiple wolf-life beasts charged at him without warning.
Equipping a staff, he swung it down with all his might and noticed something strange happened. The moment his staff had touched one of the beasts, it disappeared into smoke.
Stab!
Soon, the pain of a spike piercing into skin as felt and quickly turning, he swung his staff again, Just like last time, the beast turned into smoke and another attack pierced his thigh.
'Are these clones or illusions? Each time I strike one of them, I receive an attack.' He thought, slightly annoyed.
Stab!
Slash!
Slash!
By standing still, he was avoiding each strike and began notice his movement was becoming slowed. He also noticed that there was a delay between each attack and the beast clone or illusions didn't bother to move.
'It's like it can change between each clone…' Although he could easily get rid of the beasts, he needed to think for once instead of using brute strength.
Slash!
'I think I know now.'
Swoosh!
As one of the clones lunged forward, he reached forward and grabbed a spike from the sky. The clone itself disappeared and another clone came charging in and the same thing happened again. The spike came from the sky instead of clones.
"I see now… These are all just some type of illusion, not a clone. You can reveal yourself now! Your tricks won't work on me!" Sebastian shouted at the beast.
"I should've known not to attack a demon like you." As the illusion of the beasts disappeared and turned into the smoke, a humanoid figure appeared from the smoke and proceeded to walk toward him.
After the smoke disappeared, a smoking hot looking lady emerged from the smoke with a smoke pipe in hand.
"What are you gonna do? Kill me?" She asked.
"Maybe. Your ability to cast illusions seems interesting to me so it wouldn't hurt to create a weapon from you." Sebastian replied.
"What? You only see me as material?!" She stomped her foot on the ground and slowly stomped toward him.
Shing!
Before she could get any closer, Sebastian pulled out his Umbral Blade and pointed it toward her neck. "I'd suggest not getting closer." He said.
ROAR!!!
A loud roar shook the inside cavern and created a small distraction for the woman to leave. Barely taking four steps, a scythe's blade appeared in front of her neck.
"You brought me here so it means you know the way out, right?" Sebastian asked.
Fearing for her life, she replied. "Yes, but the boss of this dungeon won't let you escape."
Upon hearing the word 'dungeon', Sebastian's thoughts immediately became greedy. He knew there were three types of locations a portal could take you: a labyrinth, a dungeon and a location.
A labyrinth contained powerful beasts and trials that tested one's wits, courage, and problem-solving. These were set up by mystical beings or past high-ranking mages to determine if they are worthy of obtaining their treasures and knowledge within.
A dungeon contained treasures, artifacts and powerful beasts. They were similar to labyrinths except these held more powerful beasts than them and were less challenging as they didn't have puzzles. Last but not least, these mainly supplied adventurers with better material and rewards.
"Let's clear this dungeon then!" Sebastian said, brimming with greed and excitement.
"What?! The dungeon boss is Mid-D and it will be impossible to kill it."
"That indeed will be a problem… If the boss is a high rank, then it means the beasts are high ranking too, right?"
"Yes, but what does that have to do with anything?"
A smile appeared on Sebastian's face as he thought about it. This was a chance to increase his strength to the next level.
"If you don't want to die, then you'll assist me in killing everything in this dungeon."
Walking forward, Sebastian was determined to kill every beast in the dungeon. As a primordial werewolf, each beast he ate would give him strength but it wasn't a big boost of strength.
As if it was responding to his determination, the Umbral Blade's black energy began to stretch and wrap around Sebastian's arm to his shoulder. The blade then began to flare like fire as if it was alive.
"Your blade… moves as if it's alive." The woman said.
Pulling his blade up to his face, Sebastian started to inspect it and noticed it did look like it was alive.
"Maybe it is alive but we'll never know."
As they were approaching a few beasts, the blade began to glow and pulsate with energy, and a surge of power entered his body.
Roar!
Sensing an intruder, four beasts stood up and looked toward their direction. Upon their arrival, they saw a woman and noticed another intruder. Surprised, the beasts were now wary of the other intruder.
"Haha!" Sebastian chuckled. "This is very exciting!"
'Huh? Why did this boy's presence just change?' The woman noticed.
Slowly stepping forward, Sebastian was pulling off his top clothing. Underneath, his scarred body and marking was revealed to the woman
'My! What a surprise!' She thought about his scarred body until she laid eyes on his marking. 'That marking… I recognized it from those ancient texts.'
Rushing forward wildly with a crazed smile, he swung his blade down and a slash of black energy was released. After the attack was released, one of the beasts rushed forward and took the brunt of the attack while the other three continued forward.
After the attack struck their ally, the beasts closed the distance and two of them lunged forward for Sebastian while the other went for the woman. Dodging one of two beasts, he swung his blade and contested the other beast's attack,
Now behind him, the beast turned around and swiped with its claws. As the claws were about to make contact, a strange blue energy erected and contested the beast's strength.
"Just go down already!" Sebastian shouted as his red eye flashed brightly.
Feeling an incoming attack, the beast jumped back and dodged to the right.
Bang!
The wall behind it had shattered from a red force of energy. Staring toward Sebastian, the beast noticed its fellow brethren was battling a strange blue energy.
"Losing focus while in combat is a fatal mistake!" Sebastian said, appearing beside the beast and swinging his blade down.
Bang!
Flying back, he saw the fourth beast standing with his blade's black energy spreading throughout its body.
Bang!
Turning around to face the noise, he saw the woman standing on top of two deceased beasts.
"I guess your strength is best used against a beast with low intelligence." Sebastian said to the woman.
"Hmph! How dare you let a woman deal with your problems." She retorted.
Bang!
"You lowly servants can't even deal with a few weaklings!?" A large creature shouted in anger.
Looking at the creature, it had green skin, pointed ears, and fangs. Its body was muscular and had multiple scars on its body along with red body paint all over its body.
"It's been a while since I last saw a human. Did you know? Orcs mark their body with war paint to show how many strong beings they killed." Around the orc's body, its intimidating presence was spreading throughout the room.
"Are you the boss of this dungeon or the pawn of it?" Sebastian asked.
"Blasphemy! How dare you say I'm the boss! I'm nothing but his humble and loyal servant!"
In an instant, the orc appeared above Sebastian and swung his giant cleaver down.
Bang!
Surprised, Sebastian barely had time to move as his left arm was now missing. When the orc made its move, he didn't even see it move and only saw a blade near his face.
Another attack was incoming and slightly moved his head back, his eye was grazed and blood came gushing out.
"Damn, woman! Help me or we will both die!" Sebastian shouted.
Taking a quick glance toward the woman, he noticed she was frozen in fear. He found it strange but it wasn't until he noticed two more orcs of similar strength were standing idle.
'Impossible. I should've been able to notice them approaching us… unless!' Looking around, he noticed a fourth orc and it was a mage orc.
"It's useless to struggle!" The orc shouted.
'This bastard is receiving buffs from that one!'
With no choice, he turned and grabbed the woman before flash-stepping away. As much as he didn't want to grab the woman, he needed to since she held information about the dungeon.
"Why didn't you say this dungeon contained orcs?!" Sebastian asked in anger.
Shocked by the appearance of the orcs, the woman didn't respond and remained quiet until they arrived at a safe location.
"Goddamn it, woman!"
Slap!
With a slap to the face, the woman felt a jolt of pain and fell to the ground. Although it may have seemed harsh to slap a woman, Sebastian couldn't care less. She withheld valuable information that could've determined their survivability.
"Ask my question! Why didn't you tell me about the orcs?!"
Staring at Sebastian, his figure was replaced by that of an orc. Her body was violently shaking and tears began to run down her eyes.
Upon seeing her tears, Sebastian realized he was being too harsh and sat against a wall.
"Get some rest. I'll think of a plan to escape this place."
Still, she couldn't sleep and kept her sight on Sebastian in fear for what he would do when she would sleep.
'She's traumatized… I suppose I'll just have to knock her out.'
Without warning, Sebastian appeared beside her and chopped her neck.
"Now, what to do… These orcs may be low-ranking ones, but I heard they're meant to be at least A–Rank and above… A false dungeon? But that's unheard of…" Sebastian talked to himself.
Slowly walking out of the safe area, Sebastian decided to have a look around and gauge the strength of each orcs to determine if all orcs were of similar strength or if those orcs were just exceptions.
"Do you hear? There's supposed to be two humans roaming this dungeon." A voice spoke.
"Humans? We haven't seen those in a long time! If we find them, do you think our boss will raise our rank?!" A similar voice said, enthusiastically.
Turning the corner, Sebastian saw two orcs and both were wielding weapons.
'Guess those were exceptions.'
Swoosh!
"Sorry to intrude during your search but I need your strength!"
Before the orcs could do anything, they heard a blade swing through the air and felt a strange sensation all over their bodies. They both turned their heads slowly to look toward Sebastian and saw him put his sword back into its scabbard.
"I suppose you want to know what I did?" Sebastian said, blood leaking out of his mouth and eyes. "By sacrificing my life-force energy, my blade grants me abnormal strength and speed. The strength and speed itself depends on how much life-energy I'm willing to give it. Right now, I gave it a quarter of life-force and cut you into a hundred pieces and you may think I'll die but I regenerate a lot of life-force energy as is."
Upon hearing this, the orcs stood there and looked at each other before moving slightly, and falling into hundred pieces.