_________________________

CLASS : Skeleton ​​

LEVEL : 86

RANK : B+

ROLE : Hell guard

AFFINITY/ABILITIES :

• Elemental shadow (active skill)

• Dance of the dead (active skill)

• ?????

• ?????

HP : 5170/5170

STRENGTH (STR) : 80

DEFENSE (DEF) : ??

STAMINA (STA) : ??

INTELLIGENCE (INT) : 23

AGILITY (AGI) : 35

ACCURACY (ACC) : 60

EVADE (EVD) : 30

CHARISMA (CHA) : —

THREAT LEVEL : Mediocre

REMARK : Apart from the armour, he’s just a walking stack of bones. Let your hounds have a feast.

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“So?” Nathan was getting impatient.

“Nope, definitely not an A rank.” Arnold replied.

“Damn it. Either way gotta kill this guy.”

Arnold and the others were just standing outside the boss room, when this 10 feet tall, armored skeleton appeared inside the boss room. Since the team was aiming to slay an A rank monster everyone was excited. Nina informed everyone that Arnold had great knowledge on monsters so he’d be able to guess the level and rank of the monster, as he was going to use his [PROBE] skill on it either way so he obliged and ‘guessed’ the rank of the monster in front of them.

“Nathan you’re a genius, I thought we’d just leave the giant skeleton to chill in his room.” Everyone erupted in laughter while Arnold took out his guns and created a bunch of <Basic Enchanted Ice Bullets>.

“I really like this new guy. He’s too good, haha…” Joshua Blair, the 28 year old main tank of the group, laughed it out. Even though Arnold was meeting with Joshua for the first time, he knew Joshua was both a stable and a reliable person.

“I’m sure you do. After all you’re both a pain in the-”

ROOOOAAARRRR!

The skeleton bellowed as if saying, “Are you idiots coming in or not? I don’t have my entire life to die by your hands.”

“We Shouldn’t keep our host waiting right?” The voice belonged to Orla Craig, the young and beautiful healer of the team. She was kind and well mannered like most of the healers were but hell, she was full of sass as well.

“Just wait a bit before we go inside, I want to try something.” Arnold said and activated his [FORESIGHT] ability.

Arnold was familiar with the foresight ability. Even though it had lots of demerits it was still useful. While the ‘prophecies’ were not all knowing, as he could only see bits and pieces of the future, plus the fact, that the future shown in the [FORESIGHT] would not be too far away in advance, it’ll still be able to show him if there’s a trap or something inside the boss room.

Just like what happened the last time he used the skill, Arnold was only able to see what would happen after they enter the chamber, and nothing else. He sighed and told everyone to move inside.

“What was that about? You wanted to take a nap?” Nina joked as the 10 man squad entered the boss room.

“What do you want us to do?” Arnold asked Nathan as he was the team leader.

“You sure that monster is not ranked A right?” Nathan asked once again.

“Positive.”

“Then… All the A rankers, step back. Let the juniors take charge of this battle and Arnold will be their leader.” Nathan barked his orders, “If anything goes south we’ll immediately take charge, you okay with this?”

“Actually, all of you can be on stand by. I’ll take of Mr. Bones alone. Feel free to interject is anything goes wrong okay?” Arnold wanted to do this because it’ll increase his reputation in the family and he might even get some benefits out of it. Furthermore the monster was only ranked as B+, the same rank as Duke, Marshal and Cerberus¹. He was pretty confident that he’ll be able to solo the [BONE BERSERKER].

“You’re at rank C right? I don’t think it’s a good idea…” Orla interrupted.

“Don’t worry about it. Nathan can vouch for my skills.”

“He’s right, but if anything happens we’ll immediately charge in. Got it?” Nathan replied.

Arnold nodded, pulled his hoodie up to his face, and summoned everyone out. If he was going to do it, why not look cool while doing it?

_________________________

QUESTS : Berserker.

• [ INTRODUCTION ] : You are indulged in combat with [BONE BERSERKER], the creature has impenetrable defense and high stamina.

[ TASK ] : Kill the [BONE BERSERKER]

[ PROGRESS ] : 0/1 Kill

[ REWARDS FOR COMPLETION ] :

• 1500 EXP

• one random reward

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“High defense huh?” Arnold shook his head, “Does it even matter against the amount of true damage I can deal? Cerberus, restrict its movement will you?”

The two headed hound, howled and charged at the Berserker with the other hounds at his paws. This was Arnold’s go to tactic for now, he let the hounds lead the attack as they had higher attack stat than the golems, while he used the golems to either defend himself or to reinforce the hounds. The hounds and Berserker were soon locked in combat and various notifications started popping up.

_________________________

Your summons inflicted : 482 points of physical damage to your target.

Total damage dealt after reduction due to defense : 121 points.

Target’s remaining HP : 5049/5170

_________________________

“That defense is truly disgusting…” Arnold looked at the golems standing by his side and continued, “Ready to throw some lances?”

Both Duke and Marshal nodded, while the remaining golem went to reinforce the hounds. Once the golems were ready, Arnold used the ability, [FROZEN LANCE]. He ordered Duke and Marshal to throw the lances whenever they found the opportunity to do so. He trusted them with this responsibility as their strength was higher than his own, meaning they’d be able to deal more damage to the Berserker. While they were busy with the lances, Arnold took out the [VINDICATOR] and added a single bullet in it, after all he only needed one bullet to activate [DEMON BLITZ]. To further increase his damage output, he even activated [BERSERKER’S RAGE] and fired upon the Bone Berserker.

With the cumulative efforts of Arnold, his summons and his active and passive abilities, the health of the Bone Berserker fell below 50%. Arnold kept attacking the monster but now most of his skills were in cooldown, thus his damage wasn’t much. As soon as the Berserker’s health touched the mark of 49%, he stopped attacking the hounds and the golems, and furiously started stomping on the ground which so cracked open, dozens of skeletal warriors came out of it. The [DANCE OF THE DEAD²] had begun.

*****

1. Cerberus, is the name of the first lava hound that Arnold managed to permanently enhance. He was the strongest of the lava hounds and acted as their leader.

2. [DANCE OF THE DEAD] is a special skill of the [BONE BERSERKER], who calls out a number of skeletal warriors from hell to aid him in a battle. The number of skeletal warriors called, depends on the amount of damage the [BONE BERSERKER] received. For every 2% of HP lost, one skeletal warrior would be created.