Chapter 48: Saved By A Hair
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While having to hope for his sister’s victory, Kevin was fighting and putting his life on the line to stop the gigantic army of hundreds of monsters constantly emerging from within the faraway mountains of the Dungeon, where the Dungeon Boss was slowly making their way here.
There were mostly C-Rank monsters, which weren’t that much of a challenge when he had Berth as his tank; however, because occasionally B-Rank monsters would pop up, the challenge sometimes ramped up, and he would have to rely on Berth’s protection too much to remain alive.
Although Berth was incredibly strong, when they were surrounded by four B+ Rank monsters, they were bound to struggle, especially when their hue sizes and overwhelmingly powerful physical attacks were constantly throwing them around the battlefield.
A Frost Wyvern, a Glacial Snake King, a Giant Glacial Wolf, and a Yeti King were all it took to finally overwhelm them. Maybe if they were fighting at their full potential and energy, they would be lasting longer, but after having slain over a hundred monsters and dozens of B-Rank monsters, mostly relying on their Sponsor's powers, even these two notable members of the Golden Shield Guild struggled to maintain themselves alive.
Henrietta wasn’t here to help them out, and without other powerful damage dealers to offer them their aid, Berth and Kevin were brought to a corner. All four of the powerful “Kings” who directly served the Boss of this Dungeon glared at their two powerful and hardy prey, which seemed to be finally giving up to their exhaustion.
“GROARH!” The Yeti King roared furiously, suddenly hitting Berth with all his strength with a gigantic punch!
BAAAM!
“Unnggh…” Berth groaned, barely managing to use his powerful shield to resist the hit. He quickly vomited blood. He had been overexerting himself. He was much more durable with a healer, but because they had hurried here with whatever personnel they had, this was as much as he could last.
Overusing the skills given to him by Gawain would exert a backlash on Berth as well. One of his skills that allowed him to resist the most damage was also a double-edged knife, as it would slowly give him back all the damage he blocked after a certain cooldown.
And now, he was suffering through that backlash at the same time as he was defending the young brother of his guild master.
Any other tanker might have already died, but Berth was incredible.
“BERTH!” Kevin cried, running towards his side. The boy desperately tried to grab a potion from his pocket, but they had consumed all the healing pills they had.
“Hurry… Run away, Kevin.” Berth muttered. "I'll... grab their attention with my Lion's Roar.”
“No, you can’t die! You’re our guild’s most valuable tanker!” Kevin cried. "And... you’re my friend!”
“Heh… Kevin, one day, you will shine brighter than even Lady Henrietta.” Berth muttered, vomiting blood. “Ugh… Please, run away. And live.”
Kevin’s eyes began crying as he saw his senior dying; his divine aura began surging from within him as he glared at the tyrannical monsters, whose stats were further enhanced through Leviathan’s presence.
“No… Stop! You cannot overdo it, Kevin! If you overuse your sponsor’s powers, you will die." Berth muttered.
“Ungh…” Just as Berth said, as Kevin tried to confront the beasts, he felt his entire body twist; blood quickly gushed out of his eyes, and he fell into the snow. “Aagh…!”
“D-Dammit! I told you! You should have run!” Berth roared, standing up in front of Kevin and pointing his shield at the monsters. “LION’S ROAR!!!”
“ROOOAAARRR!”
A gigantic aura of a roaring lion appeared above Berth as all the monsters suddenly put their attention on him, leaping towards him! Slashing attacks, body slams, punches, and even beams of magic power reached Berth as he tanked all hits like an unmovable mountain.
“KEVIN! RUN!!!”
“B-Berth…!”
Kevin gritted his teeth, quickly beginning to crawl away from there, standing back up with whatever strength he had left and running, running, and running faster as he saw his senior being attacked and slowly being torn to shreds.
“No… NOOO!”
However.
FLUOSH!
An enormous blizzard fell from the west, reaching the monsters and then blowing them away from where Berth was. The ice barely did any damage to the ice-attributed monsters, but the winds were so strong that even those giants were flung into the skies!
“W-What?!”
The presence of an enormously powerful entity emerged, with so much mana overflowing from that being that it spread everywhere, covering the skies and the floor. Kevin could only remember a presence similar to that, and it was that of an S-Rank hunter.
However, amidst the blizzard, what emerged from within was a young, Asian girl with shiny blue eyes. Keving was left flabbergasted as he saw another brown-haired girl walking behind her as she carried her two small monsters.
The Frost Wyvern, the Glacial Snake, the Giant Glacial Wolf, and the Yeti King, however, quickly defied her powers, rushing to attack her and her friend. However, the girl behind her quickly pointed her hands at the monsters, gathering her mana and even using the mana of the blue-eyed girl as she channeled a tremendous amount of magical power, creating a magic circle and firing a massive beam. The beam of light quickly blasted all B+ Rank monsters from the map, frying them alive. Their corpses fell over the snow motionlessly.
"Who are they?”
Dan Baihe and Anna ran towards Kevin, looking to see if he was alright.
“Are you alright?" Anna asked, gasping for air. Her mana had been emptied once more, but this time she didn’t have to overexert herself to the point of breaking apart her body.
It was because of a powerful S-rank skill she had acquired, of course. And one of the two skills she was given was the choice to copy from Dan Baihe. In the end, because her physique is mostly light and fire, she decided not to pick Frost Queen, as it was incompatible with her elements, and decided to pick the [Great Sorceress (S)] skill.
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[Great Sorceress (S): Lv1]
[Skill EXP: 0/10000]
An Innate Skill that only natural-born magic geniuses can learn. It grants them the power to freely manipulate Mana, absorb it from the environment, and conjure advanced Magical Formulas as Magic Circles, giving them an incredibly wide variety of Magic Spells that they can create and modify based on their necessities.
Enhances Magic Spells Power, Conjuration Speed, and Effects by +150%, Enhances Natural Mana Regeneration Speed by +100%, and allows for the absorption of Mana from the environment or designated targets.
Level Bonus (1): Exhaustion from emptying Mana Reserves is decreased by -50%. When Mana is emptied, Mana Regeneration Speed increases by an additional +100% and the MP Stat can increase by a small amount permanently.
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It was an insane skill, which is why Dan Baihe was able to conjure such powerful magic from the get-go. When combining this skill’s effects with her other skills, Anna felt like she could grow even faster than before.
“Hah, if it wasn’t for your new authority, I wouldn’t have been able to blast those things. Thanks a lot, Baihe.” Anna sighed.
"It only scared and decreased the monster stats a bit; it wasn’t anything too crazy.” Dan Baihe giggled a bit.
“Hey! Are you listening to us? Hello?” Anna asked, looking at the dumbfounded Kevin.
“Y-You… Ah! Berth! Is he okay?! I am alright! We need to go look for Berth!” Kevin panicked, only to see a large centipede bring him over. “Ah, they got him!!!”
“Wait, hold up, boy; that’s my friend. He’s Violet, and he’s bringing Berth here.” Anna sighed. "Ugh, this guy is as annoying as I remember him from the novel." She thought.
Anna quickly remembered how annoying Kevin was—too stubborn, too stupid, and too reckless. If he had run away when Berth told him, he could have survived, but he almost got eaten by monsters.
"Well, he does seem to have gone through a bit of character development, though; Berth almost died," Anna thought.
However, after having gone through everything today, Anna was feeling rather cheerful. The half-dying Berth wasn’t going to change her mindset today!
"He's really in a terrible state." Dan Baihe said.
“BERTH!” Kevin ran towards Berth, who had lost one of his legs and arms as he was mauled by the monsters.
“If we had come here sooner…” Dan Baihe sighed.
“Don’t blame yourself for this,” Anna said, patting her shoulder. “Kevin, this is your fault!”
“E-Eh?! My fault?” Kevin asked. “A-And how the heck do you even know my name?!”
“I just know it.” Anna giggled. “Henrietta comes to visit my brother’s house almost daily.”
“W-Wait, is your brother that bastard…?” Kevin asked.
“Bastard?! Don’t call my brother a “bastard”!” Anna said. She looked furious. “Anyways, it is because of your recklessness and insistence on wanting to join your sister that you two got into such a pinch. You should have escaped and called for reinforcements instead.”
Anna felt slightly shameless, though, as she was perhaps just as reckless sometimes. But now she had to just give him a good reprimand.
“K-Kevin…” Berth groaned.
“Berth! We’ll bring you to safety!” Kevin cried.
"Please, you have to run." Berth muttered.
“Use the escape stone now,” Anna said.
“B-But…” Kevin said.
“Ugh, don’t be stubborn!” Anna roared.
Kevin was getting fed up with the snarky girl that showed up out of nowhere, but she had shown a strength he had yet to achieve without almost killing himself. He felt forced to trust her, as he often respected the strong.
CRACK!
Kevin gritted his teeth, shattering an Escape Stone as a Gate leading outside opened.
“Now go! Hurry!” Anna said.
“You’re not coming?!” Kevin asked. “Are you crazy or something-”
“Just go, you damn brat!”
Anna kicked Kevin inside the portal while carrying Berth. She put her head through and saw that both landed just fine. She quickly saw a swarm of people surround them, and an ambulance quickly showed up at the scene.
“Good.” She nodded, quickly going back to the Gate.
“W-Was that okay?” Baihe felt slightly doubtful of Anna’s actions so far.
“Well? He was really the annoying type; I don’t have much patience right now to talk with him.” Anna sighed, crossing her arms. “Now with this out of the way, we should quickly rejoin Henrietta and my brother.”
“R-Right!” Baihe nodded.
Anna didn’t want to bring along two half-dead men, so she left them back on Earth while collecting the monster corpses and making her way to her brother.
As long as she could use Anubis’ judgment on Darius, this would be over really quickly.
However, getting in the middle of such a battle was not going to be easy.
And as if things couldn’t get any better, the Dungeon Boss' steps drew closer and closer.
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