Just as Richard ordered, the Adventurers were working on tight formation.
Novice and Common Adventurers were busy fighting against the ordinary Skeletons, while Experts and Masters handled the Mages.
The Veterans had the middle-ground and dealt with the Soldiers.
As for the Heroic Rank Adventurers, their task was already obvious—defeating the Skeleton Knights.
There were a total of six Heroic Ranks, but with Lux taking care of the projectiles, that left only five. No one bothered saying anything to each other, but there was an implicit agreement among them that they would simply take two each.
And so, they marched forward.
~BOOM!~
They easily cleared the Skeletons—no matter what variant they were—in their paths while racing towards the main enemies they had to beat.
Usually, fighting against B-Tier Monsters was something Heroic Rank Adventurers had no problem doing. There were certain tricky ones that could cause trouble, but they were still not too much of a threat.
However, when it came to Undead, especially Skeleton Knights, things were a little tricky.
Monsters usually never wielded Items, and even though some were intelligent enough to use weapons, they usually weren't enchanted.
But…
Undead—especially humanoid ones—were prone to be equipped with Items. The stronger the variant, the higher the chances that they were wielding some incredibly powerful Items.
That strongly applied to the Skeleton Knights.
Depending on the kind of Enchanted Items, and how many were being wielded by one Skeleton Knight, it could be considered an A-Tier Monster.
It was the same way a human with B-Tier Skills and capabilities could end up as a Heroic Rank Adventurer—technically an A-Tier entity.
The supplementary power provided by Items played a very vital role in battle, and just by a single glance, it was clear that the Skeleton Knights were equipped with some high-quality Items.
Their weapons gleamed with danger, and the bulky armor they wore was immaculate.
They were coated in all-black, which sharply contrasted the fading white of their bones, while matching well with the purple sparks in their sockets.
Still, whether B-Tier or A-Tier, it didn't really matter to the Heroic Rank Adventurers.
They were capable of handling any—especially if it was a one-on-one battle.
At most, each would fight two at the same time, which wasn't really feasible considering how spread-apart each Skeleton Knight was.
Perhaps if it was a massively overpowered A-Tier Monster, even one would be an issue. But, a Skeleton Knight was nothing!
… Not to Adventurers of such caliber.
*******
~CLANG!~
The invisible katana of Noah Sherlock easily parried the blow of the Knight that thought it had a clean shot, causing it to stumble back as a result of the recoil.
~ZZZTTTZZZ!~
A burst of lightning soared from his blade, and he threw it like a javelin towards the head of the Monster.
~WHOOSH!~
In no time at all, they were separated. Smoke rose from the corpse, and the smell of cooked bone filled the immediate surroundings.
"Heh!" Noah stretched his hand out, and his blade returned to his grasp in no time at all.
His Katana [Night Blade] had three special functions:
Shrink and Grow
Turn Invisible
Always return to the wielder.
These three effects were further amplified by the other Enchanted Items in his possession—one of which was a ring that infused the Lightning Element on anything he wielded.
He had a bunch of other Items that dealt with other Elemental Attributes, so his blade would remain as versatile as it could possibly be.
Also, since there was such a thing as an Equip Limit, Noah used a smart workaround to subvert his limits.
—Item Supplementation!
By supplementing an Enchanted Item with other Items, making it essentially one Item, you could wield that one Item and it counted as one.
Of course, matters of compatibility were a big factor in this, and it didn't always work, but Noah was able to pick and choose the best kinds of Items that suited him most thanks to the vast amount of money he had.
'It's I good thing I went to KariBlanc and shopped as much as I could before leaving the Capital.'
He could always swap out Items too, thanks to having a few Spatial Rings in his possession.
Anytime his Item ran out of Mana, he could always refill it with supplementary Items or refined Mana Stones.
If an Item wasn't being useful in a certain situation, he could swap it out for better or more useful equipment.
The Items in his arsenal was versatile.
That was his true strength—the real reason he felt confident enough in his ability as a Heroic Rank Adventurer.
Or rather, that used to be the case.
~BOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM!~
The loud eruption that came from the distance caused Noah to abandon most of his confidence.
The sheer scale of the attack was unbelievable, and it swallowed everything within it in that explosion of light.
It came from a single person.
"Jet…" Noah mumbled to himself as he gazed at the streaks of purple that zoomed all around and about.
Everywhere the purple streak of light went, destruction followed.
"… What a beast."
Compared to Jet's Chaos Blade, which easily cleared so many enemies with a single swing, Noah felt like his own Night Blade was junk.
He had never thought of his katana in such a way, but any man would feel the same if they caught just a single glace at Jet in action.
He had long defeated his quota of Skeleton Knights, so he was just assisting the battle by getting rid of most of the mobs by himself.
Noah was sure that about a hundred Skeletons were slaughtered by just a single swing of his blade.
They didn't even offer any kind of resistance.
"Now it feels weird calling myself a Heroic Rank Adventurer like him…" Noah chuckled, finding the despair of the situation mildly amusing.
Right in front of him was the display of pure power, and he didn't want to miss out.
'I suppose I'll have to try a lot harder too.'