With a loud BOOOM, the trap boxed off the area and slammed into the ceiling, draining Brance of nearly all his Mana and causing him to drop down on one knee while panting. However, before he could admire his work, Cynrik’s howls of rage entered the mind link.
[OI FUCK FACE, YOU TRAPPED ME IN HERE WITH THESE DAMNED DINOSAURS!] Cynrik howled as he flitted over to the top of a wall and banged on it like a door.
[Bah, you’ll be fine. Think of it as your punishment for being an idiot and not focusing on the fight.] Chuckling lightly, Brance waved that it was safe for Gabby to come down and turned his back to the Terra Constructed wall.
[FUCK YOU! IF YOU DON’T MAKE A DOOR FOR ME TO GET OUT, THEN THEN THEN… I’LL RIDE ONE OF THESE FUCKERS!] Unable to formulate a proper insult, Cynrik quickly fell into an annoyed silence before looking down at the three dinos, which collapsed and lay on the stone floor belly first. Seeing how their backs were exposed to him, he quickly used the “ima ride them” excuse as bait to convince Brance to let him out of the trap.
[Go for it; you have like 18 minutes or something; just don’t get killed or injure them further. You’ve tuckered them out to the point where they can’t even move properly anymore, so if you want to ride a dead-fish, ain’t nobody gonna stop you, Cyn.] Deactivating [Mana Sight], Brance received a Mana pot from Gabby and polished off a couple more before sighing heavily as his MP soared back up to 60%
Exhaling before taking a deep breath and feeling the ambient Mana flowing around him, Brance looked over at Gabby and smiled.
“Get some rest; we have some time before we start fighting again. Try to recover your stamina.” Brance said as he glanced over at the timer, which showed 47:32, before sitting down and closing his eyes. He needed to clear his head and feel the slow tick of Mana draining for the upkeep of the Walls.
Meanwhile, inside the trap, Cynrik was hanging from the ceiling with one hand. He had worked his short sword into the crack between the ceiling and one of the walls, allowing him to stay safe and above the injured creatures below.
‘Tsk, fucking asshole.’ Cynrik thought as he uncorked a Stamina pot and topped off his resource stat. He had only burned about 10% during his little game of cat and mouse, so he was relatively fresh. Then there was his MP, which was recovering thanks to his Title and high regeneration rate.
Chewing on his lip, Cynrik activated [Spectre Concealment], pressed against the wall, and removed his shortsword from the crevice. Next, pushing off the Terra construct, he bounced between the wall and the nearest pillar until he touched down on the ground silently.
Looking around and feeling he was an adequate distance from the tired RaptorBasilisks, Cynrik sat down with his back against the wall and began counting while watching their HP bars slowly increase point by point.
His eyes narrowed slightly as he came up with a rough number representing the creature’s regeneration rate.
[Brance, how much time did you say was left?] Cynrik asked as he felt an uncomfortable feeling in his chest.
[Uh, the timer says 45:50; why?] Opening his eyes to check the clock, Brance responded before closing them once again and relaxing.
[Bad news, little brother. These guys are healing by 10 points a second. That’s 6k HP regen every ten minutes. By the point we are ready to make our move, these fuckers will almost be back at full health.] As Cynrik spoke, he could see the muscles and flesh on Stumpy’s shoulder squirm as it healed.
[Worse yet, Stumpy seems to be pulling a Piccolo. If the movement I see from its shoulder is any representation, it appears to be restoring its lost limb.] Activating [Mana Sight], Cynrik examined the cluster of particles swarming around the one-armed dino’s shoulder and soon nodded in confirmation.
[Yep, definitely pulling a Piccolo. Not too sure if Stumpy is using an Affinity Skill or if it’s just natural regeneration like a lizard with its tail, but I can without a doubt say the thing should have a whole arm before we are ready to kill them.]
[Got it. So what is your plan? Are you going to kick their ass when their HP is capped off, or just leave them be?] Brance asked as he felt Gabby sit down beside him and rest her head on his shoulder.
[I’ll play with them for a little while; I want to see how close I can get with my stealth skill before I get noticed. When you give me the go-ahead, I’ll hack them to bits and steal all three kills.] Cynrik snorted with a grin on his lips.
[HEY! Why do you get all three kills?] Tensing his body and startling Gabby, who was nodding off, Brance complained.
[Cause fuck you, that’s why. You were the one who locked me in here with these things. Thus, you must pay the toll. Either I get all three kills, or I use enough Mana to blast apart your little trap. Hmm, I wonder how much Mana that would take?] Fighting the urge to giggle like a little psychopath, Cynrik used his thumb to tap the pads of each finger on his left hand.
[UGH, fuck, whatever, do what you want. Gabby and I are napping, so fuck off already.] Unable to muster the energy to argue, Brance wrapped his arm around Gabby, who snuggled into his chest as her breathing slowed down, indicating she was already asleep.
‘Tsk, gross. Those two are out there doing couple shit, while I only have these virtual dinos as company. I wonder how Selene is doing…no fuck that, why am I worried about that wench.’ Standing up and shaking his head to clear his thoughts, Cynrik figured he could kill time by checking how close he could get to the tired and injured RaptorBasilisks before they noticed his presence.
Moving forward slowly, one step at a time, he counted each footstep until he was within three meters of Stumpy when it raised its head and looked around with heightened vigilance. When it saw nothing, the creature put its head back down and huffed out some air through its singed reptilian nostrils.
The moment the creature lifted its head, Cynrik froze in place, and it wasn’t until it put its head back down that he continued forward until he was close enough to touch the dino.
It took quite a bit of effort for him not to reach out and place his hand on it, but in the end, his rationality returned, and he backed off. The simple knowledge that dinosaurs or animals resembling them was almost too much for his brain to handle. So although he wanted desperately to reenact the scene from a specific dinosaur movie franchise, where a scientist placed her hand on a triceratops’s side, he didn’t and moved across the enclosed area to test how good the perception of the other two dinos was.
Time moved slowly until Brance finally opened his eyes and saw the timer showing 31:12.
[Minute twelve left Cyn, get ready.] He said as he roused Gabby from her nap.
Rubbing her eyes and sitting up, she glowered at Brance for ruining her comfort and reluctantly stood back up and performed a few warm-up exercises.
Smiling at Gabby, Brance swapped back to his katana Loadout since he had spent the break without a weapon equipped and unsheathed the sword to check it over for any damage it may have sustained during previous battles.
Beside him, Gabby unholstered her crossbow and preloaded a bolt into the weapon before putting it back on her hip and unsheathing her dagger.
“Gabby, when Ivar kills the creatures, I plan on dropping a single wall. Exactly one minute after, six fresh enemies will spawn.” Pausing, Brance thought for a moment before poking at his brother.
[Hey, how fast are we planning on taking these things out?]
[Here’s my idea Brancie. We kill the first three, which in turn spawns two per death. Meaning we will have six on the field a minute later. Next, we split them up, two each, three minutes later, we temporarily drop the numbers back to zero, but one minute later, we will have four each.] Channeling Dark and Fire Mana into both hands, Cynrik crept forward and got a clear line of sight on all three resting RaptorBasilisks.
[The goal is to hold off all 12 for two minutes while chipping away at their HP until the three-minute mark hits, which is when we will kill off two each, dropping the total of enemies from twelve to six. However, when the respawn happens, we will now have 18 to deal with. Splitting them up, we will end up with six each. Keeping on the move and continually draining their HP over time, we take out two weakest of our packs, each again precisely three minutes after the respawn.]
Exhaling and catching onto Cynrik’s plan, Brance started narrating the strategy to Gabby, who stiffened at the thought of having six of the scary dinosaurs constantly chasing after her.
[Once the respawn happens, we end up with eight dinos each, and just like before, we continuously cut down, two every three minutes. The total goes three to zero, six to zero, twelve to six, eighteen to twelve, twenty-four to eighteen, up to thirty, back to twenty-four.] Cynrik continued counting, killing two add six until he reached the final minutes of the fight, where there would be a total of 48 RaptorBasilisks on the field at one time, meaning everyone had to deal with 16, but when he got to that point, Brance stopped him since Gabby cut in.
“Hold on…going by his method, then that means with 60 seconds left on the timer, we need to kill 16 each… Björn, I don’t know that I can do that. I don’t have a super-strong attack like you two do.” Gabby practically shouted while looking at her boyfriend with concerned eyes.
“Sure, the total matches since we will all have 31 kills allowing us to pass the first part of the challenge, but why is Big Bro Ivar expecting me to wipe out so many on my own.” Pacing back and forth flusteredly, Gabby complained to Brance, who only shook his head.
“Gabby, you are misunderstanding. You need to factor in your chip damage. The point is to whittle down all of their HP to where most of the enemies have under 25% left. You should only be killing off the weakest of the batch. That way, you only need to deal with the two new ones getting added on the respawn.” Brance said while catching the girl and holding her in place.
[TIMES UP, KILLING ALL THREE NOW!] Despite Cynrik’s warning, the words were completely unnecessary. Half a beat later, the trap walls shook as Cynrik unleashed a magical miniature black sun that immediately wiped out all three dinos.
-This series is exclusively published on WebNovel if you are reading it anywhere else…You Wrong, Fam. PS Check out the discord, https://discord.gg/dcxKNJEMwg-