Putting On A Show Pt2

After using a giant sword for so many fights, wielding something normal in size once again felt like a whole knew world.

Each stroke and draw of either arms felt like it was twice as fast as before, hacking out before tucking my elbow in to scythe into and out of the bodies of demons pitting themselves against me. The damage might have been lowered but the sheer grade of the originally A grade alloy had risen to S plus and the effect on these A-grade enemies was insane.

Getting up close and smashing through the Taurian demons was honestly a bit easier with a single giant sword. They had Strengths equal to my own but the bigger sword crushed easily onto their defending arms and would naturally shake a demon's balance. These smaller blades were easier to block with their demonic weapons but they were now so swift that they could only be blocked once or twice before finding an opening in which to thrust.

As for the other demons like the geckos whose numbers were thinner in this outpost, they stood little chance with their basic melee-and-shield set-ups. For the most part, I did not even need to use magic offensively and actually started practicing my defense with it.

The weapons skills from the lesser and greater Taurian demons were mostly based in darkness, allowing me to use the light-based Soulfire for defense. My swords were wreathed in the flames of my own divine soul and the trail of fire left in their wake could be used as to make a brief curtain which dispersed the dark elemental attacks flying through the air.

Of course, it also increased the pure physical damage of my attacks, cutting away as much as forty percent of a demon's health in a single slash or stab. Luckily, with the giant mana pool at my disposal and the incredible conductivity of my swords I had little trouble sustaining the magic on my swords.

When the others finally caught up to me after sustaining the ranged retaliation of the demons it was clear that our efforts in training had born fruits. Attacks that would have previously drained away over ten percent of their HP were now closer to or even below ten percent on the healers and ranged characters. This could also be attributed to their armor, but each person made their own suits and thus no two armor were the same in specs despite the fact everyone had the same average HP response to the attacks.

Besides, none of their suits were on par with those made by my or Mistress' teams since Donna and Little Thirteen had only brought along people who focused on combat skills and levels rather than crafting and auxiliary abilities. With this in mind, their defenses and resistances were naturally high now and their new armor merely augmented this.

Not long after the broad line of players met the front lines of demons we were already pushing our way through to the wall. My team was naturally digging through the enemies while the others filled in around them, securing the space they cleared with their much stronger attacks augmented by the presence of their much stronger familiars.

Throughout the recent battles the other players had been consistently losing familiars due to the overwhelming numbers of enemies while even my own team had suffered similar losses. We had yet to lose our all-important female imps who supported us with steadily growing magics but the few imp warriors and many of the mounts had been lost already.

The only solace I could find in this was that at least none of my team had died since the fight with Zekrom despite the enemy strengths and numbers.

Shouldering aside one large dying body to thrust Dark Hauntings into the side of an unsuspecting Taurian engaging another player, I simply kick this demon to the ground and off of my blade while using Enlightened Hauntings to sweep through an incoming dark sword skill.

As soon as the dark aura was dispelled an actual dark sword came chopping down at my body only to meet the bladed bracer of my right arm. Another two swords came stabbing in from either side in a pincer, forcing me to step back and avoid the colliding points. Just as the fourth weapon was slashing through, though, Dark Hauntings in my left hand thrust through the middle of the Taurian's arms and straight for where I imagined its heart to be.

Sixty percent of its health was gone in an instant and continued draining several percent at a time as thick black blood flowed out from around my sword. A quick kick and inward slice from my right Hauntings ended the Taurian's life before I normally spun to the side to slash into the next body straight ahead.

The next few Taurians fell in almost as many seconds as players began crowding around me, helping to occupy the enemy numbers that were slowly spreading out around us in an attempt to box us in.

Unlike the other clans, though, I had a few skills which could cause mass damage and turn the tables on such tactics. Once the enemies ahead started thinning while spreading out around us, I simply channeled my Soulfire and Spirit Slash into either sword before slashing them out from ahead of me.

Two brilliantly burning crescents of spiritual mana with a thousand MP from either sword scythed out through the battlefield, passing through hundreds of bodies at once while reaping close to fifty percent of health from each of them. The Soulfire Spirit Slash attacks reached all of the way to the enemy walls, exploding against the piled rubble with an intense combination of true damage, knockback, and blazing PATK that leveled over a hundred feet of boulder wall.

As if the call to arms had been made once again, the players all responded in unison with a quick flurry of their basic combat skills that traveled out for around ten yards while spells were launched toward the back of the enemy forces. The players seemed to be holding back on their faster skills, using their higher grade abilities upon confronting the front lines before relying on basic attacks.

Now, under our own pincer of skills the enemy numbers thinned out by the hundreds, cutting roughly a thousand demons and undead down to only a few hundred in seconds. Thanks to the mass damage that I caused, this fight now looked almost easy. Which was exactly what we wanted.

I had yet to use any of my cordycep or personal advanced skills but we had already wiped most of the siege defense from this outpost. I had not even used 30 Edge or forced Geist to appear and I did not plan it. With the potential other clans spectating us, we needed to lure them into a false sense of security in order for our plan to work.

Only a few moments after the pincer of skills our line of bodies was divide down the middle, turning our ranks into parallel lines to face the enemies our attacks had just divided down the middle while circling us. The uniformity of the two main clans making up our numbers helped the pace of this strategy, as well as the fact that the two main clans were responsible for the two main types of troops making up our numbers.

Under this kind of adaptive assault the demons were left shocked and awed while being cut down with haste, crippling the morale of the once battle crazy demons. They fell swiftly after that, leaving us with only a handful of fallen while at least a thousand bodies turned the field into a thick black puddle about our feet.

Inside the breach in the wall waited more demons fronted by large undead abominations and a few dozen bone fiends using their bodies as bulwarks. Numerous weapon skills and even elemental magic poured out from among the larger bodies, passing safely through the bulwark to harass and harangue our advance.

For the most part I responded with simple cutters and spirit magic, canceling out multiple skills at a time as I rushed forward and took point for the small player army. Many attacks still made it passed me, but the others on my team fanned out behind me took responsibility for the defense by releasing their own ranged skills to cancel out the attacks.

We managed to approach the breached wall with little damage taken to our numbers, forcing the undead and fiends to come out and play at close quarters. The ranged attacks were forced to stop thanks to this, preserving their own numbers who would have been splashed with such damage. However, I was once again forced to use enlarged and empowered Spirit Slashes to compensate for the insane defenses of these giant enemies while everybody's skills were cooling.

After the breach defenders came out to play, it took us around thirty seconds to actually enter the outpost. Inside we found where this outpost was keeping their wraiths, hidden about the buildings and behind the walls waiting for us to enter. Many of the occupants now were gecko demons and dozens of chimeras, focusing on defending these wraiths as they 'rushed' towards the players.

Hoping to preserve potential allies, I had no choice but to take up a passive stance and start using Channeling. Dozens of wraiths died during the first few pulses due to having gotten too close, finding themselves distracted or outright stunned by the psychic ability while under fire. The ones further out, though, managed to survive as the following pulses began 'neutralizing' their current affinities.

I found myself under a heavy concentration of attacks as I switched to passivity, having stood out with my flashy skills that marked me as the most powerful player present. Like the clans who were aware of my notorious abilities, these demons knew that I was an MVP and their best chances of survival were to get rid of me.

However, as I stopped in action my team naturally gathered around me with Stonewall, Papi, and Go at the forefront. Even when demons tried to clash with us in close quarters they found themselves battered aside or impaled on Stonewall's giant wall shield. Cleaning up the flanks with their large primary weapons, many of these weaker demons found themselves smashed and hacked apart by a giant pick hammer or poleax.

Stonewall's personal boss demon maintained a front line position with the players, counting himself lucky to be among the ranks of my elite familiars. From his placement off to the side with Imperial it was clear that his level of strength was not on par with theirs. It seemed they were literally using him just for the reach of his weapon to support Imperial.

Orion was actually playing the tank role, drawing all the aggro not focused on my party and I as he forced his way toward the central headquarters structure. At either side blurred Cweeper and Hermes, minimizing Orion's damage intake while obeying the simple orders to remain unseen. Literally using their skills and speed to simply be hard to follow at all.

By the time the players' skills cooled and they could completely relieve the pressure on our elite familiars, I had managed to neutralize and retreat more than half of the wraiths. Sadly, the rest were all caught in the crossfire and thus would probably cost us heavily in regards to their affinity with us. Hopefully, I would not be personally accountable for this.

Once the wraiths had been sent away without and real harm to the players at large, though a few had mistakenly touched or been touched I was able to reenter combat. All I found were a few dozen dying demons standing guard in the open ground surrounding the headquarters, leaving me with nothing to attack.

Rushing ahead while briefly considering how to angle this part of the operation, I decide to literally play to the strengths of the other clans and play a smaller role. This included not leveling the structure and discarding all of their numbers. For the sake of displaying a rigged walkthrough, we had to not only show an easy win but also show them how it was done.

While we could make open space from a large structure and capture the enemy bosses, we had to make a bad example of at least this one guy. Otherwise I would have started empowering the other clans, capturing the demon elites for them to claim. However, there was no way that I could show the other clans that these demons were actually open to capture.

Sure, we had our own demon bosses on full display, but there were also four empty outposts and these guys probably had limited knowledge of not only demons but the dungeon as a whole. More than likely, they had no introduction to the location's backstory since they followed other clans here.

Plus, they probably did not have my Luck.

Joining the other clans before the large outstretched entrance of the headquarters where only a single large undead was barring the way with dozens of large and obscure bodies behind, I say, "This one's on you guys."

"What?" Donna asks quickly, turning to look at me sharply as they and their elites were refreshing themselves with items behind several lines of tanks and healers bracing to tackle the structure. "You're not going to be putting on a show?"

"No, you guys have to take the stage," I say with a shrug while leisurely sheathing my swords together behind my back. "Just go in, draw them out, and wear 'em down. Their numbers will be about half of yours and you can use Mistress and her team as a reserve troop near the end. The other guys have to see you guys doing it this way so they follow in your steps, sending their elites to the slaughter. However, I'm pretty sure only you guys could actually survive an attrition tactic like this."

"Do we get to keep the boss?" Little Thirteen asks immediately, going for gold in an instant by trying to strike a bargain of sorts. "The profit margins down here are pretty slim, most of the demon's weapons break with them. We barely have enough Taurian weapons to supply our current troops and they're level one hundred restricted."

Shaking my head, I antagonistically say, "Do you get to show them the bosses can be tamed? Fuck no. monkey see, monkey do. When they attack an outpost, we'll attack and outpost and catch your demons in private. Besides, we need to resupply all of our familiars."

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