Astaroth and the party slowed down their march after the howls. They could meet wolves at any moment now, so they tightened up their formation and walked in a loose circle, observing their surroundings.

As they trudged along, Aj’axx, who was at the vanguard, lifted his hand, stopping the group. He then pointed farther up ahead and made a four with his fingers.

Just across the tree line was a small clearing and in the clearing were four wolves, chewing on what looked like the remains of a deer.

The party stopped advancing at the tree line, to stay out of sight. Then they discussed their attack plan through inaudible whispers.

“I’ll go in and taunt them, then the Colonel can keep aggro with me while everyone attacks.” Aj’axx said.

“Astaroth, you can attack them, but at the smallest sign of one turning to you, run back behind me or the Colonel, whichever one is not aggro’d, so we can keep them off of you. Got it?” He added.

“Yes, sir.” Astaroth nodded.

Although Chris was the highest in rank among them, all of them had fought enough together to know that once the fight began, Chris would no longer be giving out orders. So it fell on the tank in their group to coordinate all of them.

Once all of them were clear on their roles, Aj’axx dashed through the tree line and yelled.

“Eyes on me, you dumb dogs! Today you die!” He hollered, smacking his shield with his mace.

‘Nice taunt’ Astaroth thought, holding in a snicker.

The four wolves in the clearing all turned their heads to the man, growling and snarling, drool mixed with blood dripping from their mouths. All the others in the party then ran into the clearing, getting into formation there.

Astaroth then inspected the enemies, to know what they were up against.

Dire Wolf:

Level: 30

Grade: Common

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Dire Wolf:

Level: 32

Grade: Common

Health: 5’750 Mana: 915

Dire Wolf:

Level: 34

Grade: Common

Health: 7’250 Mana: 1’030

Dire Wolf:

Level: 35

Grade: Common

Health: 8’250 Mana: 1’100

The level values were higher than theirs, but he still stayed confident. As the combat started, he enhanced his weapon with magic, then he roamed around and went in and out, dealing one hit to every mob, to get all the Exp from the kills.

Wielding his longsword with both hands, he hit the strongest enemy first, going down in levels as he went.

*-176* *-176* *-177* *-356!*

During his hit-and-run tactic, he caught the level thirty wolf off guard and hit it in the neck, landing a critical hit! The wolf, which had not yet been hit by anyone else, immediately turned around to face him after that.

He had overtaken aggro with the high damage number. Astaroth tried running back toward the group to have Chris sap away the aggro, but both he and Aj’axx were busy, so he couldn’t rely on them.

When Korin saw the situation Astaroth had put himself into he clicked his tongue.

‘Amateur’ He thought, changing trajectory to go help the newbie.

Meanwhile, Astaroth’s brain worked at super speed, thinking of his potential solutions. He decided now was as good a time as any to try his hand at solo killing the beast.

He could see Korin running in at high speed to help him, but he wasn’t gonna let the rogue steal away Exp from him!

“Stay away!” Astaroth yelled.

“I got this one!” He added.

Then he swapped out his longsword for the short sword and shield. He cast ‘Mana Skin’ and another ‘Enhance Weapon’ but this time on the shield, to focus purely on defense.

His defense shot up to 26.8% with the armor bonus and his shield went from 10% blocked to 20% blocked. Of course, all this cost him a lot of mana.

These three spells all cost him fifty points each, bringing his mana to 235/385. And he wasn’t done.

He then murmured another chant.

“Spirit Summoning: White Death.”

Another hundred mana points left his mana lobe, leaving him slightly fatigued. But it was all worth it, as the next second, an ethereal wolf lunged out of his body, biting at the Dire wolf’s neck.

*-260!*

White Death had used his ‘Soul Bite’ ability, draining away 5% of the enemy wolf’s stats.

While White Death held the wolf in its maw, Astaroth stabbed its eyes with his short sword, making sure the aggro remained on him.

*-298!*

He hit the bullseye, and the crit kept his damage number comfortably over his summons. Korin, who had been dashing in for support, finally halted to a stop.

He watched on for a few seconds and judged that the rookie didn’t need his help for now. The wolf ghost he had summoned was helping him enough, so he went back to the primary group of enemies.

Of course, not that Astaroth had the situation completely under control, but he still blocked the attacks that would hit him every time, reducing the damage taken significantly.

And when he dropped under fifty percent of his health, a cool wind washed over him, restoring a whopping 315 health to him. He looked around to find where the healing came from and understood.

I’dril, the reaver, was a half-caster, half-healer class. He would attack a monster with a red and black tendril, then the tendril came back to him and blew back out as a healing wind.

‘That’s an interesting class’ Astaroth thought.

He had brief eye contact with I’dril and nodded his way. I’dril nodded back.

The fight went on for a few minutes until the only fighters left fighting were Astaroth and his wolf. The others had cleared the other three wolves already but didn’t want to take away anything from the rookie, after seeing him fight so fiercely.

They had a newfound respect for him, again, this time for his battle prowess. Astaroth fought and fought until the Dire Wolf finally succumbed to the onslaught.