First Wave

"Well… That's just great…" Enzo grumbled.

Monsters indeed started rushing through the trees of the forest on the mainland and onto the drawbridge, but it wasn't fully what Enzo was expecting.

The problem was in the type of monster that was currently rushing towards the group.

[Mutated Crab]

[Level 10]

[HP: 800/800]

The reason these crab monsters were a problem is because of their extremely tough shells. The shells rendered all the preparation with the oil and fire useless. It might serve to slow down the crab monsters, but not by much.

Another problem was the sheer numbers coming at them at the moment.

Enzo thought the enemies would be numbered in the tens because of how low leveled the average player was at the moment, but he was completely wrong. There were currently hundreds of crabs running towards them at the moment.

This wouldn't be much of a problem either if not for their species again. If Enzo's assumptions were correct in that the shells would make it harder to kill the crab monsters, then killing them in large groups would be exponentially harder as well.

"Weak spot is where their legs meet their bodies!" Hephaestus yelled out while Enzo was lost in his thoughts.

Enzo shook his head and stopped trying to think of new ways to deal with this group of crabs and decided to just fight.

He got into his archery stance and readied an arrow before quickly letting it fly.

There was no reason to wait for the crabs to get closer when they had a stock of so many arrows to waste. Hephaestus and Enzo were the only archers in the group so they shot out a small shower of arrows onto the crabs with just the two of them.

As the crabs got within 40 feet Enzo got a better look at them.

He could now see the weak spot that Hephaestus noticed a while ago. It was indeed where the legs met the body and actually spanned a large area, so it would be hard to miss.

The crabs had dark red shells that looked freshly polished, extremely sharp legs and pincers, and large eyes with red pupils. The crabs were at least 5 feet tall on average, but some were a foot or two larger.

Woosh! Woosh! Woosh!

-100 -100 -100

The sound of arrows flying from their bows continued to ring out as Enzo and Hephaestus continued their shower of arrows until the crabs got close enough. They didn't kill many crabs with their arrows, but took down a few of them so it was worth it.

"Let's go down. It will be much better if we fight regularly." Enzo said.

"Agreed." Hephaestus responded.

They quickly ran down the stairs of the high castle walls and met up with the rest of the group.

Everyone was standing in a straight line, waiting behind the open gate that led into the castle courtyard. Jane was the exception to this rule as she stood behind everyone. This time, she could participate in the direct fighting with her new Reaper Fruit abilities, but it was still better for her to not participate until necessary.

Enzo stood at the end of the line and drew his kyoketsu-shoge from his inventory and wrapped the ropes around his arms.

'Time to really test these bad boys out.'

Seeing as there was plenty of space between him and his allies, and there was a dedicated healer in their party, Enzo felt comfortable testing out his new weapons to their fullest extent at the moment.

He swung his arms around and unwrapped a few feet of the rope from his arms. The daggers at the ends of the rope swung around in a helicopter motion in front of Enzo's hands.

Rumble! Rumble!

Not a single sound came from the mouths of the crabs as they stormed through the gates, but the sound of the earth shaking under their crab legs was almost as loud as a minor earthquake.

In a last minute decision, Enzo decided to put one of his kyoketsu-shoge away. He wasn't fully aware how to use them, but he figured it would be much easier to use while having one hand free to manipulate the rope.

The crabs quickly passed through the gateway and started running towards their party members one by one.

Enzo tossed his dagger at the crab closest to him.

-1000

[You have killed a Mutated Crab]

[+1 Exp]

The dagger went through the weak spot of the crab and cut it off cleanly.

'Nice.' Enzo congratulated himself on a good throw.

He pulled on the rope with a lot of strength, and incidentally hit another crab in its weak spot of the legs as well.

-1000

[You have killed a Mutated Crab]

[+1 Exp]

Enzo had to be extra careful as he caught the dagger that was returning to him with a lot of speed. He didn't want another incident where he injures himself with his own weapon again. Jane may be watching over them, but he didn't want to waste her healing spells if he didn't need to.

Enzo got to work killing many other crabs as they came towards him.

Using the kyoketsu-shoge and deciding to only use one of them proved to be a very smart decision on Enzo's part.

He swung the blade around like a helicopter blade and threw it at his enemies whenever they got close enough. The blade didn't always hit the legs of the crabs and sometimes just harmlessly bounced off their shells, but most of his throws were surprisingly accurate for his experience using this type of weapon.

Enzo started to dance around, using spins and jumps to alter the direction of the blade and increase the power behind his throws.

His talent with weapons and intuitive intellect was starting to show as it usually did in moments like these.

Enzo may not have looked like a master, but he definitely did not look like a beginner user of the kyoketsu-shoge.

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Bonus chapter for all the support on the new novel. Thanks again guys.

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