Chapter 103: A Monster I

There is only a few minutes left till the fighting starts, now would be a good time to land. I don't see any open clearings nearby for easy combat, I cant have everything I want. I dive towards the ground and level out before hitting the ground, I flap my wings in a way to slow me down and I come to a gentle stop. Its nice to see progress, and my flying abilities are getting better. I move my wings into an offensive look, stretched out and sharp looking. They still retain their powerful look despite being stretched just a little. I'll be able to test my theory about whether or not my wings do more than 2% damage to the total health pool with weaker or same leveled creatures. I look at the countdown one last time and see less than 30 seconds left.

[World-wide Announcement: I wish all players the best of luck! Try your hardest! I'll be keeping track of the kill count per player and who does the best among you! People who kill the most will receive special rewards! So be sure to rack up those kills while you can!]

A final announcement rings out and gives a surprise to everyone. The more greedy ones will kill steal and make it harder for the rest. It was a good idea to hide this information till now, it'll be harder for the greedy ones to plan and make things difficult. Only a few more seconds till the fighting starts all over this new land, and I will admit that I'm excited. Its been so long since I've gotten to fight, well it really hasn't. It just feels that way, and that happens to everyone. My thoughts are interrupted as the countdown runs out, and I'm met with monsters. "*SCREECH!*" Multiple monsters are screaming and making a bunch of noise as they rush at me from the darkness. I draw my blade and take a breath, this is going to be fun.

I'm instantly surrounded by 10 or more monsters leaping from the darkness of the woods. I don't have anytime to inspect them and see what they are. They don't look familiar to me, which means these monsters are exclusive to whatever is happening. At least that's what I think, they are closing in fast as well. I get into my fighting form and flex my wings to make them hard, now its time to test out how much more effective I'm at in combat. They are only a few feet out now, and I use this time to attack. I spin my body hard as they leap at me, I use my wings as giant swords. I cleave multiple monsters into pieces with that single move.

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Now that I've thinned out some of the closest ones I use my sword to do some heavy damage. These monsters are so weak I don't even need to activate my best skills, slash is doing just fine. There are to many notifications about damage to really focus on the numerical information. I'll look at them after I'm done fighting. I clear out the 10 or more monsters that have just attacked me faster then I would've been able to do without my wings. I almost relax, but more screams and screeches surround me as an onslaught of monsters appear. I don't know how many there are, or how many I'm going to have to kill. If all players are dealing with something like this all I can do is hope that my family is safe. The newly appeared horde is quickly on top of me, no more time to think about my family.

There is an uncountable number now, I use my wings and blade to kill as many as I can as fast as I can. The bodies of the monsters are quickly piling up, I bring 100% of my attention to the battle since I'm being swarmed. Monster after monster tries to get close to land a single attack, but my wings and sword are making easy work of them. They all stop of a second and a circle of about 15 feet or more has formed around me, I look at them in the brief time that I have. I can see that these monsters go on for miles, and they are many different kinds. Some look like animals that have turned into monsters, and others look like unholy abominations from your worst nightmares. I don't know why so many are only attacking me, if this is for 1 person I'm sure the players are struggling right now.

They all look wary to continue attacking, and I take some time to clean the blood from my eyes to see better. I'm drenched in monster blood and guts, my golden wings are now dripping with lines of crimson. I'm going to have to take another bath after this, and that makes me a little mad. They all start shifting in a circle, and then the ones right outside of the 15 foot circle jump at me. I quickly dismember any that get close enough, the piles of the bodies is making it hard to move now. I jump up and land in a new spot, I carve my way through monsters with my wings and weapon as I run through the woods. I look behind me and monsters are already filling the path that I made, its like there is no end to them. I keep running and clearing monsters for several minutes, I finally reach the end of the horde and begin to run from the massive numbers.

If I don't want to die I'll need to find a place where I can kill all of these monsters, the piling of bodies makes it hard to stay in one spot. I can feel the ground trembling as I run through the woods, they are hot on my tail. I would fly away, but I don't want to miss this chance to earn exp and get used to fighting with my wings. I make it to a nice opening in the trees and see a field, this will do fine. I make it to the center and look in the direction I came, monsters swarm out of the tree line and rush towards me. An amount I don't want to count its already leaping towards me, I just get into that zone I use for these situations and slaughter one after another. I don't know how much time has passed or how many I've killed, but the horde has thinned out by at least 90%. I don't know how many I've killed, but its a lot.

I find myself taking deep breaths and on one knee, its much more exhausting then I thought it would be. I've never been this tired except for that time I invaded that orc camp, many of the remaining monsters run back into the woods. I look around me and see massive piles of limbs and corpses, I'm covered head to toe in blood. Only very small parts of my wings are showing any gold, the stain of crimson is all over. If games didn't numb that part of me I would be puking right now, looking at the internal organs all around me makes me a little queasy though. Those are things that you aren't supposed to see in large volumes like this, I lay on my back and just rest. This was a long and hard fought battle.

As I'm relaxing on the ground, I feel it rumble ever so slightly. I try and convince myself more aren't coming, but I know in my heart this isn't over yet. The rumbling of the ground gets louder and harder, I stand up and try to loosen up. I look over towards the tree line and see monsters heads above them, looks like they are bringing the big guns this time. Soon I'm getting swarmed again, and I continue to kill and kill. After a couple minutes the bigger ones start to get here, and I can tell these guys are going to be a pain in my ass. As Cera relentlessly battles alone, players are banding together and holding the monsters off. One such man is Sir Erikson, leading the assault with his make shift group.

They never stop coming, if the lower leveled players were on the frontlines then they would have been slaughtered. My strategies are working fine for now, but my fighters are getting tired. There aren't that many players with healing abilities either, this has become a battle of attrition and we are losing. For every player, there is one monster of equal strength. This causes problems in many ways, the biggest being when the higher leveled players finally run out of gas. The lower leveled players will have to deal with the stronger monsters. The system is playing this little test well, that's what I think at least. Testing which players to look out for and reward, and seeing which ones have no motivation for fighting and getting better. This is going to be a long battle and night, I just hope we don't lose to many levels.