Arriving behind the wolf, Eldric punched it, hoping to end its life. But with the skill on cooldown, his punch was only able to hurt it slightly.
Seeing almost no effect, Eldric was stunned for a moment before realization hit him. Till now, he had been killing the beasts in the trial with his skill and had forgotten just how weak his normal attacks were.
If it was before gaining an additional agility attribute, then Eldric would have waited in a safe place for ninety seconds before using the skill. But with his new improved agility, the wolf couldn't even touch him, much less hurt him.
"Let's see how many punches you can take." Making up his mind, Eldric kept on dodging the wolf's attack while punching it with all his strength.
It wasn't until he hit it with more than sixty normal punches that the wolf finally died and disappeared.
"Well..." Looking at how it took him almost five minutes to kill just one wolf, Eldric was silent.
Without using the skill, it was tiring for him to throw so many punches. And after killing just one wolf, he was already feeling somewhat tired.
No wonder, he didn't hear anyone clearing the trial in Hell difficulty.
[Kill 10 Creatures on the first floor: 5 Tokens]
[Points: 1070]
"Just three more." Eldric had already killed seven wolves and now only needed three more to complete this floor.
Taking a step forward he soon disappeared inside the forest, looking for them.
It didn't take more than ten minutes for Eldric to find and kill three wolves and with that, the remaining wolves disappeared from the forest, leaving Eldric alone to find the door to the next floor.
"Finally." It took him even less time to find the pitch-black door, leading to the next floor. Without any hesitation, Eldric stepped in.
"Finally the second floor." After dying countless times on the first floor, Eldric almost shed tears when he entered the second floor.
Instead of a forest, he was standing on a rocky terrain with small mound-shaped mountains. Other than the rocks and small plants, the only thing that attracted his attention was a giant figure in the distance.
Almost three meters tall, covered with grey fur, and weighing almost one thousand pounds, the giant bear looked at Eldric while standing on its two hind legs.
"....." Eldric wasn't surprised by the massive size of the bear, but narrowed his eyes and looked around him.
Eldric looked around, relieved to see that there were no trees or bushes for large creatures like bears to hide in the ambush. He scanned the area, searching for any other bears that might be waiting to pounce on him. After a while, he breathed a sigh of relief. Thankfully, he didn't have to worry about dealing with more than one bear at a time.
Without waiting for the bear to make the first move, Eldric took a step forward and rushed towards it with incredible speed. He wanted to stun it using the punch and finish it as fast as possible.
But the moment Eldric rushed forward, the bear became aware of the danger it was facing. So, under the surprised eyes of Eldric, it raised both its arms into the air before slamming them to the ground.
The moment it slammed into the ground, the numerous rocks in a radius of two meters immediately burst into small pieces flying all around with an incredible speed.
"Damn it." Eldric immediately took a step back and dodged the few stones which he was able to see due to his increased agility. But there were still a lot of stones that brushed past him, leaving behind long cuts.
Eldric didn't care about the wounds or the blood flowing through them, instead, he took a step forward and rushed towards the bear.
It had been taught in the school that powerful beasts have their own skills just like humans. And just like humans, they also need to wait before using them again.
After the bear used its skill, it was like a sitting duck to Eldric who has now the agility of two.
Arriving near it, Eldric activated his skill and punched it, leaving it stunned which was soon followed by four more punches on its head that ended its life.
[Points: 1110]
Just like killing the wolves, killing one bear gave him ten points.
"Well, that was rather easy." Clicking his tongue in wonder, Eldric found it rather simple.
If others who had gone through the trials heard him, they would have strangled him to death. It was impossible to defeat these creatures unless one had an epic or higher profession. Even if they teamed up and tried to challenge the trials, the number of enemies would change depending on the number of team members. Not to mention defeating these beasts, just running away and finding the door would be an extremely difficult task.
Eldric wasted no time as he surveyed the rocky terrain. Despite over a hundred minutes remaining after his first-floor fight, he was determined not to waste a minute. He ran around, searching for the other bears, hoping to complete the trial as quickly as possible. But to his dismay, finding and killing the remaining nine bears took him more than thirty minutes.
Wasting this much time, Eldric was almost going crazy. Unlike the previous floor where the wolves would actively attack him, other than the initial bear at the start, the remaining bears were inside caves. Eldric searched almost fifty caves before finding nine of them. Even the cave was narrow, making it impossible to move around too much and once he walked out of the cave, the bear would just return to its initial position with all its wounds completely healed and the skill's cooldown restored.
If not for his increased agility which let him only have minor wounds, Eldric would have failed this floor countless times.
"Fuck the bears." Cursing in his mind, Eldric stood in front of the door and stepped inside it, thus entering the last floor of the trial.
.
.
"Uhhh!?" As soon as he entered the third floor, he was stunned by the scenery in front of him.
Unlike the previous floors of grasslands, forest, and rocky terrain, the third floor was like a small golf field. Other than the green grass on the ground, the only thing on this floor was a giant gate in the center of the field and five large humanoid creatures sitting on five large seats made of wood.
Just a single glance was enough to change the expression of Eldric's face. The entire body of those creatures was full of muscles, like a heavyweight lifter. Their height was almost two meters and instead of a human head, they had the head of a rhinoceros.
Their upper body was naked, showing off their thick grey hide. Holding weapons in their hands, they were wearing fur pants with a few human skeleton heads hanging by their waist and a pair of boots which was made from unknown materials.
Just as Eldric was observing them, they too were observing him. In the middle, was a creature holding a long wooden staff with numerous scars on its face. It was the leader of the group.
It looked at Eldric first then at one of its own sitting at the end before raising his eyes, giving him a signal to engage in a duel against Eldric.
"Interesting." Looking at one of the creatures who stood up after receiving the signal, Eldric narrowed his eyes as he readied himself for the upcoming battle.
The creature walking toward Eldric reached out behind its seat before pulling out a mace.
It then walked towards Eldric while showing its teeth, as if mocking him. It walked slowly as if purposely letting Eldric make his first move. It was his way of giving a handicap to the weak human in front of him.
Taking a deep breath, Eldric lifted his left foot and took a step forward while lowering his body, getting in the position of someone waiting to pounce.
He then applied some force to his leg and with the agility of [2] almost became a blur.
Before the beasts could react, Eldric was already in front of him. Activating his skill, Thunderous Barrage, he punched with all his strength.
Stunned by the effects of the punch, the creature couldn't move. Although it didn't fly into the air after getting punched, it was still badly hurt.
"Finish it." Without wasting another second, Eldric punched it again aiming for the head, hoping to finish it as fast as possible.
But before his punch could connect, Eldric felt the hair on his back standing up in warning.
"Tch." Dodging to his left side, Eldric narrowly missed a long wooden staff that soon plunged into the ground, almost causing a shockwave.
Lifting his head, Eldric saw that the four remaining creatures who were sitting luxuriously just a moment ago, completely disregarding him, were now rushing toward him from all directions. Other than the leader who threw the staff, the remaining ones were holding maces.
"Damn it." Cursing Eldric distanced himself from the creature while getting ready to engage.
The firs creature holding the mace arrived near Eldric within a few seconds. Pulling the mace back it struck towards the puny human in front of him with all its strength.
Even though it was fast, it was still no match for Eldric who had [2] agility. Easily dodging the attack, Eldric punched it in the head, hoping to deal more damage, but to his dismay, its head was even harder than its chest. Compared to the first creature which was lying on the ground stunned with a clear blue mark on its chest, this punch caused almost no damage to the creature. If not for it getting stunned, Eldric would have wondered whether his punch even hit it or not.
Hoping to punch it a few more times, Eldric suddenly felt a familiar sense of crisis from his back.
Halting his punches, he dodged to one side and looked at the leader whose fist just brushed passed his body.
"....." Gritting his teeth, Eldric repeated the process.
He would dodge the attacks and then occasionally throw a few punches now and then.
Every time he tried to hit more than once, the other creatures would catch up to him, making it impossible to land a few more punches.
Eldric even tried getting rid of the leader first too, but every time he went near him, the remaining four would throw their weapons toward him and rush there.
This went on for a while. Even though Eldric wasn't able to immediately kill the creatures like the previous floors, he was still causing massive damage to them. It was just a matter of time before all of them except the leader would die.
And just as he had predicted, after a while, the creatures began to fall one by one before disappearing into specks of light.
"Now, it's just you." The moment the second last creature died, Eldric looked at the leader with a smirk.
The moment the last of its followers fell, the leader stopped in its position and looked at Eldric before throwing away its staff.
It then opened its mouth and suddenly its body began to glow with a red light.
"Shit." Eldric wanted to interrupt it, but with his skill on cooldown, his ordinary punches were of no use.
Helplessly, he could only look at the beast which was increasing in size with an incredible speed.
Within a few moments, the red light on its body disappeared, and in front of Eldric was a Humanoid beast that had grown over five meters in length and almost three meters in width.
.
.
.
"Gulp....."
Looking at the monster the size of a one-story building Eldric's legs trembled as he turned around and ran away from there as fast as possible.