Leon reacted immediately to the presence behind him. A wall of ice manifested between him and the figure, and he dashed forward to put some distance between himself and the sudden attacker.
Bang!
The tail of the Lizardman turned into a blur as it whizzed forward, shattering the ice wall and slamming into the gravity shield that Leon had conjured before coming to a stop.
Leon pounced forward immediately, grabbing hold of the thick tail and turning to fling the lizardman away from him. The lizardman was easily tossed aside, and was immediately peppered by a barrage of ice bullets.
Splash!
The lizardman fell into the water, which was immediately frozen up, but that was not enough to bring down the lizardman. A burst of flames melted away the ice, and a dark shadow dashed out of the water.
Leon was easily able to follow the movement of the lizardman, which was now wielding a sword. The golden metal of the sword flashed at Leon, and a wave of mana was sent forth, but Leon easily broke it apart with his mastery of mana thanks to the <Spell Weaver> skill. Leon then retaliated with his own attack.
The water on the lizardman’s body turned into icy needles that tried to pierce its scales, but failed because of how sturdy those scales were.
“Die!” The lizardman uttered a war cry and spun around, turning into a golden cyclone that came barreling right at Leon.
“Haha, funny!” Leon chuckled and spread his Domain over the area. Black arms reached out from the ground and grabbed onto the legs and body of the lizardman, forcing a stop to its advance and holding it in place. That spelled its doom as it was not left open to any attacks from Leon.
Whoosh!
Leon’s sword manifested in his hand and he swung it from top to bottom, slicing the lizardman into two halves. Like that, the powerful lizardman who also seemed to be a skilled with magic was killed.
[Level 42 Despair Lizardman Warrior killed. You have leveled up!]
Leon waved the notification away while thinking. If a warrior could use magic, then what about their shamans? That would mean that they would be exceptionally skilled with magic. He would need to watch out for them.
Leon walked to the body of the lizardman and raised it as an Undead. The moment life was breathed into it, it dropped down to one knee in subservience. The gold sword that had been used by the lizardman when it was still alive was fastened to its waist, and upon spotting it, Leon found the inspiration for its name.
“You will be known as Gold from now on.” Leon said. As the first of the lizardmen to have been turned into his subordinate, Leon felt that it was necessary to be given a name.
“I shall cherish this name, Master.” Gold banged his fist on his chest and rose. He immediately turned around and dashed right at the remaining monsters that had now begun to retreat as the driving force behind their attack had been killed. Gold had been the one controlling them to attack Leon, and with him dead, the only thing they felt was fear and the instinct to preserve their lives.
Leon watched as Nero, Kaladin, Grokus, and the newly summoned Gold, slaughtered all the monsters that they could. A few managed to escape with injuries, but Leon did not care about them. Instead, he was more focused on the next course of action.
With a wave of his hand, blackened and Unholy energy surged out of Leon, activating his skill, <Abyss of the Undead>. At once, all the dead monsters were burnt up and turned into his summons. Leon only saved portions of them that would prove useful to him.
One of the reasons why Leon currently valued the newly acquired summons was because they would be able to use their unique abilities that had been adapted to survival in the swamp. They would be able to sniff out whatever monsters were hiding in the swamp long before any other of his summons would have been able to.
Also, he did not want to waste any more time in the swamp. He had only wanted to pick up a few summons that were geared towards this environment before going into the dungeon and unleashing hell.
Collecting all the news summons, Leon took off into the distance with his elite summons, as well as Gold, following behind him.
Over the next few hours, as they moved, they came across many more monsters which were quickly put down and turned into more summons.
Gradually, Leon’s army of swamp monsters that he would put to use in the Despair Dungeon grew. By the time he reached the entrance to the dungeon, Leon estimated that he would have around a hundred summons that had originated from this swamp.
“My intervention will probably do a lot to the ecosystem of this place.” Leon mused as he continued to leap from tree branch to tree branch. If he took away the Despair Dungeon, then that would mean that the Gublin Empire would lose its source of endless materials and training. They would have to manage the ecosystem a lot more closely to avoid wiping out the source of all their rare goodies.
“Well, it does not concern me too much.” Leon eventually shrugged and carried on.
With each passing moment, they drew closer and closer to the gigantic tree that was in the center of the swamp. It had only taken them six hours to travel to the center of the swamp, and of course, the density of monsters became higher and higher as they moved deeper, but they were able to move without any major issues.
Eventually, they came to a stop at the edge of a larger area. The surroundings were infested with vines that wove and tangled around each other, but it was not a problem to get past them.
Leon created a bridge of ice that went over the wives and led right to the base of the tree, where a large archway was made naturally. The archway was the entrance to the Despair Dungeon.
“Finally, the true challenge begins.”